In 1975, the renowned photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson received an invitation to travel . from Paris to America for what would become one of his final photographic projects. Choose any subject, anywhere, he was told. His choice? New Jersey. New Jersey? He seemed delighted by his own provocation. "Why New Jersey?" he said. "Because people make such a funny face when you mention New Jersey."
Cartier-Bresson was semi-retired; he would spend the rest of his life drawing. His patron was unlikely: Jaune Evans, a young associate producer for "Assignment America," a television show on the public-broadcasting station WNET. Her proposal was to devote an episode to the project of his choosing. Her partner, a photographer named Peter Cunningham, would be his assistant. They were shocked when Cartier-Bresson accepted. When he arrived, people asked "Why New Jersey?" so often it became the episode's title.
This story is from the February 13 - 20, 2023 (Double Issue) edition of The New Yorker.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the February 13 - 20, 2023 (Double Issue) edition of The New Yorker.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
NIGHTBRAWLER
Imagine that you're a bouncer in a scuzzy small-town bar where some of the world's nastiest drunks go at one another with fists, knives, and broken beer bottles and that's on a good night.
TRUTH OR DARE
A new production of Henrik Ibsen's \"An Enemy of the People.\"
TWIN FEATS
The Escher Quartet's Bartók marathon; Igor Levit's symphonic piano recital.
SKIN DEEP
The hit-or-miss body art of the Whitney Biennial.
BALLPARKING IT
When America's pastime was New York's.
AROUND AND AROUND
You say you want a revolution. But what counts as one, anyway?
ALLAH HAVE MERCY MOHAMMED NASEEHO ALI
A huge hand grabbed the back of my neck as I stepped out of the Rex Cinema, and, instinctively.
ANNALS OF DESIGN - WATER WORLD
In a corner of the Rijksmuseum hangs a seventeenth-century cityscape by the Dutch Golden Age painter Gerrit Berckheyde, \"View of the Golden Bend in the Herengracht,\" which depicts the construction of Baroque mansions along one of Amsterdam's main canals.
TIME'S UP
The Conservatives have ruled Britain for almost fourteen years. What have they done to the country?
THE ART OF MEMORY
An ambitious new park attempts to tell the history of slavery through sculpture.