Post-War Architecture as 'Anonymous Sculpture'
BECHER, Bernhard, and Hilla BECHER. Anonyme Skulpturen: A Typology of Technical Constructions. New York: Wittenborn and Co. 1970.
4to. Original blue cloth, lettered in white to front cover and spine, in photoillustrated dust-jacket; pp. [216], with black-and-white photographic illustrations throughout; text in German, English, and French; small chips and short closed tears to edges of jacket, crown repaired with archival tape to reverse; a fine copy in a very good jacket.
First edition, first impression of this pioneering work on the sculptural aspect of industrial architecture.
The first photobook of the German photographers Bernhard and Hilla Becher, documenting the sculptural forms of post-war industrial architecture across Great Britain, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany. These architectural forms embodied utility and function, rather than aesthetics. The Bechers referred to these subjects as ‘anonymous sculptures’, to underline the sense of loss and melancholy they provoke and the physical beauty of industrial architecture.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Bechers received the Golden Lion from the 1990 Venice Biennale for sculpture – not photography.
SKU: 2120872