French Rule that Smoking Albert Camus Photo by Cartier-Bresson Is a “Work of Art;” Can Remain on Display

As a follow up to our report in March, entitled "Cartier-Bresson’s Photo of a Smoking Albert Camus Stirs Up Controversy," the Administrative Tribunal of Montpellier, France, decided last week that the picture of the Camus, a French Nobel Laureate, taken by France’s most celebrated photographer, Henri Cartier-Bresson, is a “work of art.”

This exempts it from France’s strict “Evin” law, which prohibits the display of any image that “promote or advertises” smoking.
 
Consequently, the photo will remain on display in the front of the city’s "Clapier" Médiathèque (multimedia library).

A group of Green(Ecology) party members had objected to it. The original complainant Thierry Teulade, has yet to decide whether to appeal the ruling.