Compare the work of Andre Kertesz and Henri Cartier-Bresson versus the work of Eugene Smith and Sebastio Salgado

 

Andre Kertesz 

       Andre Kertesz was well-known as a successful photo journalist in the world. His photography was not intended to record the major and excited moments or events but to cast attention on images seemingly “unimportant.”  In his photos he believed photos contents and photo composition were same important. His unique camera angles and style had gained him world-wide recognition. From these three pictures I choose we can see that Andre Kertesz composed his pictures perfectly and his photos concentrated on the “unimportant” subjects.  Because of these “unimportant” subjects demonstrated his photos are more realistic and Authenticity.

 

  

 Henri Cartier-Bresson 

         Henri Cartier-Bresson was a French photographer. He was considered as a famous candid photographer. He developed the “street photography” style and it has big influence on the world photography. He traveled the world in order to capture different slice of life. His photos were taken on the street with candid shot. Therefore, his photos were more naturalistic and realistic.

      Andre Kertesz and Henri Cartier-Bresson were both photojournalists were both like being invisible when they taking pictures. Their approach to photography are same, they are both taking pictures in naturalistic way. They don’t like photos edited by artificial light and cropped photos. They believed that all images should be done naturally when the pictures were made. They took realistic photos and telling true stories to their audience. Also, they took a lot of pictures from the daily life to describe their meaningful ideas. Eugene Smith and Sebastio Salgado believed the photographers should influence the photo. That means the photographer is more like a artist or a painter. They can choose the object and make the layout match what they want, so the photographer "make" the photo. Eugene Smith and Sebastio Salgado are perfectionist that is "I can't show it. This face up here needs toning , needs burning in. This thing down here needs changing . The eyes are wrong" (Lasko, 1989). They always made the picture impeccable, so they cannot take picture naturally, always have some changes on the picture.

 Eugene Smith

        

Sebastio Salgado

          So, I think the differences between the work of Andre Kertesz and Henri Cartier-Bresson versus the work of Eugene Smith and Sebastio Salgado are if photographers should influence the photograph, and if should photographs edited by photographers.  On the other hand, these two kind of  photographers are focus on describe their ideas though their photographs. Second, All of them have a strong passionate about photography and have a lots of world-famous photos. Also, all of them have very large effect on the development of photography.

2.What’s the better journalistic approach?

         In our opinion, we prefer Andre Kertesz and Henri Cartier-Bresson to Eugene Smith and Sebastio Salgado. First, we think photography is different from other artistic forms because photography is more reality and directly. we think if photographers edited photos, there is no different between painting and photography. Addition, we think a artist can use object from daily life will have struck a responsive chord in the hearts of its audiences. We can read the ideas more easier from reality than edited. So we think Andre Kertesz and Henri Cartier-Bresson is the better journalistic approach.

Source:

https://sites.google.com/site/shootingthetruth/Home/modules/week-11/course-notes-week-11

http://erickimphotography.com/blog/2011/08/10-things-henri-cartier-bresson-can-teach-you-about-street-photography/

http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/01/03/w-eugene-smith-i-didnt-write-the-rules-why-should-i-follow-them/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri_Cartier-Bresson

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/episodes/andre-kertesz/about-andre-kertesz/645/