Henri Cartier-Bresson (August 22, 1908 - August 3, 2004 ) was a prominent French photographer. His street life style photography has influenced many photographers from generation to generation. People often call him HCB - the first capital letters of his name. He created the concept of "decisive moment"; he was also called "the eye of the century." He was also regarded as the Father of modern photojournalism, the master of pure photography.

Henri Cartier-Bresson, who was born in Chanteloup-en-Brie, France on August 22 1908, was the oldest of five children of his parents. Because his parents were rich merchants, he grew up in a bourgeois fashioned family in Paris . He described his family as "socialist Catholics". Thus, he got more financial support on developing his interesting than many of his contemporaries. He started playing with a 3×4 inch view camera when he was a little boy. Although his father wished him to take over his family business, Henri found great passion on photography and was so headstrong.

Before studying in a Catholic school in Paris, 5-year-old Henri Cartier-Bresson followed his gifted uncle Louis, a painter, to study oil painting. He was sent to a private art school at 19, and studied in the Lhote Academy; later he learned painting from society portraitist Jacques Émile Blanche. He integrated modern art with works of the Renaissance. During Surrealist Movement his art became mature greatly. After having finished his studying in English art and literature in the University of Cambridge from 1928 to 1929, kindled by a 1930 photograph titled Three Boys at Lake Tanganyika by Hungarian photojournalist Martin Munkacsi, Henri turned back to photography from painting. As he said, a photograph could fix eternity in an instant.

in the early 1930s Henri Cartier-Bresson shared a studio with Polish photographer David Szymin -David Seymour and Hungarian photographer Endré Friedmann - Robert Capa, who taught him, "Don't fall into mannerism. Keep surrealism in your little heart; be a photojournalist. "

He had acted in famous French film director Jean Renoir’ film to experience the feeling on the other side of the camera and also had been invited to New York to display his pictures. In 1937 he married Ratna Mohini, a Javanese dancer, and the same year, his first press-journalist pictures was published.

During the World War II, he had been arrested by Nazis; he tried three times to escape, and succeeded in the third escape. In spring 1947, Cartier-Bresson established a renowned cooperative firm - Magnum Photos with Robert Capa, David Seymour and George. Meanwhile his first book, The Photographs of Henri Cartier-Bresson ,was published.

Henri Cartier-Bresson obtained international reputation in 1948 by his renowned photos captured the crucial historic moment -- Indian president Mohandas Gandhi's funeral and the last period of the Chinese Civil War (1949) including Guomingdang’s failure and newly born People’s Republic of China, along with some photos about the last surviving royal eunuchs in Beijing. In 1952, his another book Images à la sauvette, titled in English The Decisive Moment came into being..

Henri Cartier-Bresson died in Montjustin, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, on August 3, 2004 right before his 96 year-old birthday. With his eyes setting the major events, he had marked history and fixed its eternity.

To ensure the conservation and presentation of his works and also to support and promote those photographers who were dear to him, a foundation using his name called HCB Foundation with was created in Paris in 2003, along with a large Henri Cartier-Bresson retrospective exhibition. This foundation also has awarded to those excellent photographers biennially since 1989 and two years later, an Award was also provided for an exhibition.

Cartier-Bresson received many awards , prizes, honorary doctorates in his whole life even after death, such as many times Overseas Press Club of America Award 1948, The A.S.M.P. Award 1953, Overseas Press Club of America Award 1954, The Prix de la Société Française de Photographie 1959, etc. 2006: Prix Nadar for the photobook Henri Cartier-Bresson: Scrapbook.