Sonnabend Gallery, New York
A major retrospective of Bernd and Hilla Becher's work is currently on view at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York until 6 November 2022.
MIT Press, Water Towers, p. 217
MIT Press, Bernd and Hilla Becher: Typologies, cover and pl. 1
Schirmer/ Mosel, Bernd and Hilla Becher: Tipologie, Typologien, Typologies, pl. 15
Pompidou, Bernd et Hilla Becher, pl. 1
Fraenkel Gallery, Open Secrets, p. 26
German • Bernd 1931-2007 - Hilla 1934-2015
Husband 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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