Industrial eye Book

If I had to name a top 3 of favorite 20th century artists, chances are Bernd & Hilla Becher would be in it. Their work is simple, deceivingly so, as it has so many implications. It might not show, but a lot of work went into all these pictures: traveling across Europe and the USA, to places that aren’t meant for tourists, waiting for the right weather (fully clouded, so there won’t be any shadows in the photograph), finding the right spot to take the photo from always the same angle.

From 1959 to Bernhard’s death in 2007 the married couple have photographed thousands of structures – mainly of barns, water towers, coal tipples, cooling towers, grain elevators, coal bunkers, coke ovens, oil refineries, blast furnaces, gas tanks, storage silos, and warehouses. Their pictures might seem of interest only to those with an appetite for industrial architecture, but carefully considered, they provide a catalogue of human development, the inevitability of emerging patterns and creativity.

Each and every one of their books is great, but this one provides the best, broadest overview of their work.

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