I thought I ought to draw to the attention this book which includes superb
black and white photos Mining Head frames. Particularly featured is South
wales with some 30 pictures of headgears taken in the 1960's
Hardback 190 pp 180 illustrations Dimensions in mm: 285 x 272 Price
£48.00
Since 1959 Bernd and Hilla Becher have been photographing imperiled
industrial structures such as pit-head frames, water towers, blast furnaces,
cooling towers, gas tanks, and silos. As documenters of the industrial era
in Europe and the United States - an era now drawing to a close - they are
not only photographers, but "industrial archaeologists," salvaging
testimonies of past developments in the form of "readable" documents for
posterity. At the same time, the Bechers could also be called conceptual
artists, as their photographs reveal the meaning and transformative
character of structure.
This volume is a result of the two decades the Bechers spent searching
industrial regions of Western Europe and North America for mineheads. These
delicate giants stand over the shaft entrances of mines, housing the cages
attached to cables that move up and down the mine shaft, bringing minerals
to the surface and transferring miners back and forth from underground.
Regardless of their subject, the Bechers' photographic technique has
remained constant for decades. Eschewing dramatic lighting effects, they
shoot under overcast skies, framing their subject in the center of the
picture and shooting from a slightly raised standpoint. The effect of their
cool, rigorous approach is to reduce the individual structures they
photograph within each typological category to morphological studies
executed with artful neutrality.
WWW.moorebooks.co.uk
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