Henri Cartier-Bresson in India

Really fascinating, especially if you're a fan of recent Indian history. I didn't realize the famous picture of the Mountbattens with Nehru laughing between them (the cover of this wonderful book) was by Cartier-Besson. Lots of other famous pics of Gandhi, as well.

I wasn't sure how I felt about the book's presentation of these photographs - they jump around across time (photos of fleeing refugees during Partition in 1948, then suddenly Keralan dancers in 1960s, etc) and across space (Rajasthan on one page, Orissa on the next). If someone doesn't know India very well, or even just doesn't read the captions, they may not realize that they're seeing such very different contexts.

Also, funnily, given the intro by Satyajit Ray, I did feel a deep familiarity with these black and white portrayals of rural poverty thanks to old Indian cinema - specifically, it reminded me of some old Hindi films like Awaara or Chori Chori (incidentally, I read somewhere that Nehru adored this song - boy, do I agree). Ray's Pather Panchali, as well.

I do wonder how someone who's totally unfamiliar with Indian history, regions, etc, would interpret all these pics. The book mentioned that Cartier-Bresson (who I know zero about) made a similar book about Mexico (that I know almost zero about), so maybe I'll check that out next.