Robert Doisneau; Parisian Photographer of ‘The Kiss’

Robert Doisneau, 81, whose intimate, often poignant pictures of Parisians became some of the world’s best-known photographs. Doisneau was noted for his pictures of Paris night life, of lovers and children, workers and circus performers. Even when posed, his black-and-white photos seemed to freeze a natural instant of anonymous real life. One of his most famous pictures, “The Kiss at City Hall,” was the subject of a legal dispute last year. A retired couple was rebuffed by a court after claiming they were the young lovers immortalized stealing a kiss on a Paris street in 1950 while people pass by indifferently. They lost their case after Doisneau acknowledged he had paid two models to pose for the picture. In Paris on Friday after heart surgery.