Henri Cartier-Bresson

© Henri Cartier-Bresson/Magnum Photos, Courtesy Peter Fetterman Gallery

The artist in 1930

© Henri Cartier-Bresson/Magnum photos, Collection Fondation HBC

From the Files

+ The auction record for Cartier-Bresson was set at Christie’s New York in April when a vintage gelatin silver print of Hyères, France, 1932, sold for $265,000(est. $60–90,000).

+ Even lesser-known Cartier-Bresson prints are being sought after by collectors.The Santa Monica dealer Peter Fetterman had an exhibit of Bresson’s work last spring called “Rarely Seen,” from which he sold a 1954 photograph of young Bolshoi ballerinas at the barre for $20,000.

+ Images à la sauvette, the title of his first book of photographs, published in1952, translates as “pictures on the run.” The English edition was titled The Decisive Moment, from a quote by the 17th-century cardinal de Retz. The phrase is inextricably linked with Cartier-Bresson.

+ A highlight of this month’s photography auctions is the artist’s Rue Mouffetard, Paris, 1954, at Christie’s New York October 13–14 (est. $15–$25,000).

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Like many photojournalists who were sending film home from far-off locations,Cartier-Bresson rarely developed his own photographs. He was meticulousabout the prints, however, differentiating between those made for collectors,which he signed, and those for reproduction inpublications. The Web site of the Fondation HenriCartier-Bresson, in Paris, quotes a letter, dated 2000,in which the photographer says: “I havealways signed and autographed my photographsto the people I wished to give themto. … All other prints, which are only identifiedwith a ‘Henri Cartier-Bresson’ stampor a ‘Magnum Photos’ stamp, belong tomy own person. Therefore, anyone in possession of such a print cannot possiblyclaim in good faith that he or sheowns it.” The reality of the marketis more complicated. “That doesn’tcomment on whether those prints arelegitimate or not, or valuable or not,”says Greenberg, who sits on the boardof the foundation, established in 2003by Cartier-Bresson and his wife, thephotographer Martine Franck, andtheir daughter, Melanie. According toGarner (who calls the Magnum prints“pieces of the history of photography,”rather than art objects), those depictingdesirable subjects can sell for tensof thousands of dollars.

As for “vintage” prints, thedesignation may be important tocollectors, but to Cartier-Bresson, as to others of hisgeneration with backgrounds in photojournalism,it meant little. “He regarded the fetish of the vintageprint as a market curiosity. What mattered was theimage, beautifully printed,” says Garner, who neverthelessadds, “I would argue that collectors havethe right to feel there is something more magicalin a print made at around the time the photographwas taken, with all the differences of paper type andtherefore of color and tonality that that implies.”

The market has, indeed, placed apremium on Cartier-Bresson’s vintagework. But since his death four yearsago, when he was 95, his later printshave become more sought after, eventhose made in quantity. A signed versionof On the Banks of the Marne thatwas printed 1950–59 (est. $60–90,000)fetched $132,000 at Christie’s New York in October 2005. Some of these imagesmay not be true “later prints,” however. According to the Santa Monica dealer PeterFetterman, the term generally denotes those made in the 1980s and ’90s, when thephotography market really took off.

Cartier-Bresson continued to have prints of his negatives made until theend of his life, even though he stopped shooting pictures in the mid-1970s toturn his attention to drawing. A professional photographer before there was aphotography market, he was uninterested in the idea of creating editions of hisprints. “He made a print when he was asked for a print,” says the dealer AgatheGaillard, who worked with him for many years. “For some of the well-knownpictures, there can be more than 100 prints.” That has not thwarted the growthof his market. “It doesn’t matter, for instance, that there are lots of prints outthere for Rue Mouffetard, Paris,” says Christopher Mahoney, senior specialistin the photography department at Sotheby’s New York, referring to the 1954image of a jaunty young boy carrying a bottle of wine in each arm as he struts,grinning, down the street. “So many people want to have it that there is insufficientsupply.” A later print of Rue Mouffetard sold at Sotheby’s London thispast May for £13,100 ($25,560). Another late print of the same image had sold inNovember 2007, also at Sotheby’s London, for £10,625 ($22,085).

As Cartier-Bresson’s most emblematic works become scarcer, lesser-knownprints are attracting attention. Last March, Fetterman mounted a showof Cartier-Bresson’s work called “Rarely Seen,” from which he sold Natchez,Mississippi, 1947, depicting two dapper boys inmatching hats, for $20,000, and a print of QueenCharlotte’s Ball, 1959, an aerial view of dancing couples,for $25,000, prices that were in the exhibition’supper range. “In 2002, we were selling images for$5,000 or $6,000,” he says, “but thosesame images tripled overnight.”