236
Bernd and Hilla Becher
Watertowers
- Estimate
- $60,000 - 80,000
$143,000
Lot Details
gelatin silver prints, in 9 parts
image 15 7/8 x 12 in. (40.3 x 30.5 cm)
sheet 21 3/4 x 17 1/2 in. (55.2 x 44.5 cm)
frame 22 3/4 x 18 1/2 in. (57.8 x 47 cm)
sheet 21 3/4 x 17 1/2 in. (55.2 x 44.5 cm)
frame 22 3/4 x 18 1/2 in. (57.8 x 47 cm)
Signed, titled and annotated with installation grid and dated "WATERTOWERS 1988 Bernd Becher Hilla Becher" on a label affixed to the reverse of the mount of the first image; further, each sequentially numbered "1-9" on the reverse of the mounts.
Specialist
Full-Cataloguing
Provenance
Exhibited
Bernd and Hilla Becher
GermanHusband and wife Bernd and Hilla Becher began photographing buildings and relics of the Industrial Revolution, such as coal mines and cooling towers, in 1959. Like objective scientists removing a specimen from the field, the Bechers framed their subject in a manner that isolated it from its environment. Often, these stark, beautifully detailed prints were then displayed in grid-like structures, forming stunning 'Typologies'.By the time Bernd Becher became a professor at the Düsseldorf Art Academy in 1976 (policy would not allow Hilla to be a simultaneous appointment), the Bechers' photographs, with their seemingly neutral point of view and serial display, were already being applauded by the international art world as important works of Minimal and Conceptual Art.
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