Gare saint lazare
Photographer: Henri Cartier-Bresson
Date: 1932
Location: Gare Saint-Lazare, Paris, France
Henri Cartier-Bresson photographed a man leaping over a large puddle behind the Gare Saint-Lazare train station in Paris in 1932, his reflection perfectly mirrored in the water below, alongside a dancer's poster similarly reflected. Cartier-Bresson reportedly shot the image through a gap in a fence surrounding a construction site, catching the moment without the leaper knowing he was being photographed. The image became the defining example of Cartier-Bresson's concept of the 'decisive moment' — the idea that a great photograph captures a split second in which form, content, and meaning converge perfectly. Published in his landmark 1952 book 'Images à la Sauvette' (released in English as 'The Decisive Moment' with a cover designed by Henri Matisse), the photograph is considered one of the greatest ever taken and is foundational to the tradition of street photography and photojournalism. Cartier-Bresson was a co-founder of Magnum Photos (1947).
← Explore all photos on the map
