Transcript from Contacts: Bernd and Hilla Becher

HB When I first came to Dsseldorf in the 1950s, I was very impressed by the Ruhr region, at the time the Ruhr was still very active, with many blast furnaces, steel works and mines. And I was always very moved to see these strange and manifold creatures slipping past my train window. BB We took our first photos together around 1958; at the time we had an extraordinary 6 x 9, a Linhoff. We began in the area of Siegen which is were I was born, for me this was important because its a little bit autobiographical, because nearly all my ancestors had worked in the mining industry, either as miners or in the blast furnaces. We then continued to photograph in the Ruhr region, then in the industrial regions of the centre of France and in 1965 we went to Britain for the first time, mainly in the South of Wales. From 1972 we went to the United States several times, to typically industrial regions like Pennsylvania. HB Broadly speaking, you could say that heavy industry is our key subject; heavy industry includes coal mining, steel and the limestone industry. In the factories we visited we first chose those buildings which bore the deepest traces of their form: extraction towers, blast furnaces, and limestone furnaces. But there were other buildings too, cooling towers for instance, water towers and heat recuperators. To put it another way, objects whose development followed an historical thread, which can be compared and whose emergence is not accidental. BB For us at the time, we were trying to carry off these objects, Ill call them things, but we couldnt carry them off in their original form. By photographing them, we shrank them and turned them into images because we were convinced that in a very particular way they bore witness to their time architecturally, and that this architecture was wholly related to an economy, or rather to the thinking behind an industrial economy. Then came the moment when I realised that these objects were doomed to disappear. For me, this was an architecture just as important as that of medieval quarries, which evoke for us the thinking of another age. HB We took a very large number of shots, firstly out of fascination and sentimentality, and they had to be put into order. We did the classification afterwards having familiarised ourselves with these objects. We first defined the basic forms, but then as time went on we realised that these forms came in different varieties and sub-species. BB So we decided to put one photo beside the other so as to create a typology as we call it. And the variety of form was such, that in classifying the photographs according to group we brought out the tiny differences between each object. In groups of nine, twelve or fifteen, which resulted in a sort of harmony. In each typology, each object corresponds to an other,

there are horizontal, vertical and diagonal correspondences. And when you look at these objects its very important that number one still bears some relation to number fifteen for instance, the last image. HB A water tower is basically quite a simple structure, its an elevated container, yet its surprising the types of water towers there are. From simple wooden barrels, which you see on the roofs of buildings in New York, to much more refined ornamental structures. Despite this, they all have the same function; they produce pressure and serve as reservoirs in case of shortage. And if we lined them all up, one beside the other they evoke a certain spirit of an age, or a way of thinking. BB In nearly all cases we photographed them using a telephoto lens so as to avoid distortion. Sometimes we used a very long lens up to 600mm, so we had to work with two tripods to avoid the slightest vibration. This photo here is part of a series of twin water towers, it wasnt very easy, we had to take the shot in winter, in summer branches hid the lower parts. We drove out there several times, I think it was in 1962 or 1963, until we had the right weather conditions, and we had to wait for a foggy day so that the background would disappear because we didnt want to tamper with the images. We were also interested in the surrounding workers gardens, because they were typical of railroad water towers. We nearly always photographed blast furnaces from a wide-angle, from nearby furnaces in most cases, while we photographed the upper parts, which we called the head as things apart. In such cases we also worked with a telephoto lens. HB In our work exposure time is relatively long, first because of the large format we use, we have to adjust the aperture so that the opening is very small, so we get a very accurate image. Secondly, we nearly always work on cloudy days, when there isnt much light. BB When we work with a long exposure time, closing the lens down to 32 or 45, we keep the shutter open for 20 seconds, its a lovely moment counting to twenty, we are very concentrated and oblivious to every one. HB The viewer might feel that there is no question of composition, on the contrary. For certain objects its very simple, we compose the centre of the shot and a keep a little of the surrounding environment, ones to the left and right, above and below. One thing is absolutely important, the horizon. How do you bring the horizon in? It must be below the three-quarter line of the object so as not to interfere with the effect. For more complex objects, framing becomes very important, above all when taking perspective shots where you have to be careful how lines run in such a way that they dont run straight into the angle, or that there isnt a white object in the top or bottom of the shot, which would really disturb the composition. The formats we use are relatively standard ones. In the beginning a 30 x 40 format suited us well. Later, for single photographs we tried using a 50 x 60 format, which

could be hung separately in a museum or on a large wall, because otherwise being too small, they would have got lost. For me the purpose of photography is to see in an objective way, why should I try to project my own sentiments, or my state of mind on to something which is already expressing itself. Of course, objectivity is the opposite of subjectivity we have trouble separating the two, one beginning where the other leaves off. And objectivity doesnt mean that the truth has been found, far from it, it means that the object represented is allowed to speak for itself. Strange Shrank Harmony Evoke Aperture Format(3) took autobiographical industrial(2) key age factories buildings typology(2) function exposure(2) framing

bore witness doomed diagonal telephoto(2) accurate hung relation tripods oblivious objective

shots order varieties

container despite hid weather foggy composition(2) objectivity(2) horizon(2) itself