Textile Mill, Soviet Union
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
gelatin silver print
Dimensions
image: 16.5 × 25.4 cm (6 1/2 × 10 in.)
Classification
Photograph
Department
CPH
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of Gary Davis
Accession Number
2012.118.15
Art Historical Context
Henri Cartier-Bresson, legendary French photographer and co-founder of Magnum Photos, *Textile Mill, Soviet Union* in 1954 during one of the first Western photographic forays into the USSR after World War II. This gelatin silver print offers a rare glimpse into Soviet industrial life amid the early Khrushchev thaw, following Stalin's death in 1953. Amid Cold War tensions, Cartier-Bresson's visit documented the everyday rhythms of workers in a textile factory, highlighting the human element within the state's massive collectivized economy. Renowned for his "decisive moment" philosophy—seizing ...
About the Artist
Henri Cartier-Bresson
Henri Cartier-Bresson (1908–2004) is widely regarded as one of the most important photographers of the twentieth century, a founding figure of modern photojournalism and the originator of the concept of the 'decisive moment' — the instant when form, meaning, and geometry align in a single unrepeatable image. Born on 22 August 1908 in Chanteloup-en-Brie, France, into a wealthy textile family, he wa...