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NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The New Orleans Museum of Art has announced a major gift to its photography department – the third such announcement this month.

A news release Thursday said collectors Cherye R. and James F. Pierce have given the museum more than 260 photographs, from vintage to contemporary.

“Retrato de lo eterno (Portrait of the Eternal),” 1935, by Manuel Alvarez Bravo. The print is a gift from Cherye R. and James F. Pierce to the museum. (Courtesy of New Orleans Museum of Art via AP)

They include a print of Robert Capa’s “The Falling Soldier,” taken in 1936 during the Spanish Civil War, and the 1932 photograph titled “Behind the Gare St. Lazare,” which many consider Henri Cartier-Bresson’s best work.

Another print of that Cartier-Bresson photograph sold at a London auction in 2017 for £131,000 (about $170,300), according to the Phillips Auctioneers website.

“Cherye and Jim were pioneers in the collecting of photography” said Susan Taylor, the museum’s director.

“Their prescient decision to collect and their dedication to the medium will have a profound impact on the museum’s ability to share a fuller history of photography with our public.”

Earlier this month, the museum announced a major fund and pledged endowment from Del and Ginger Hall of Chicago.

And on Feb. 4, it announced that radiologist Russell Albright had willed the museum nearly 400 works including more than 350 photographs.

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