Piazza della Signoria, Florence, Italy, 1933

Piazza della Signoria, Florence was one of Henri Cartier-Bresson's favorite images. He included it in his first solo exhibition in 1933 and his last retrospective in 2003, as well as in his first monograph The Decisive Moment in 1952 and his last one in 2003, Henri Cartier-Bresson: The Man, the Image and the World. With hopes of making sales from that first exhibition, 'Photographs by Henri Cartier-Bresson and Anti-Graphic Photography,' he optimistically supplied the pioneering Julien Levy Gallery, New York more than one print of several of the images. It is not known whether the present lot or the Art Institute of Chicago's example is the actual print that had been included in that exhibition. It is believed that a print of Piazza della Signoria was also included in Cartier-Bresson's second exhibition at the Julien Levy Gallery in 1935, 'Documentary and Anti-Graphic Photographs by Henri Cartier-Bresson, Walker Evans and Manuel Alvarez Bravo.' In any case, because of the 602 Madison Avenue address written on the back of the print in Cartier-Bresson's hand, the latest it could have been made would be 1937 when Julien Levy moved his gallery to a different address.