Boris Becker: Bunker 1984–89

700 bunkers in more than 40 West German cities

Both an artist's book and an archive book, this publication sheds light on an important and moving aspect of German history. It shows the most diverse types of high-rise bunkers, built in particular during the Second World War 1940-1944 and focussed on the period 1984-1989 by the artist and photographer Boris Becker. When he began his documentary project, the Cold War was almost over and the concrete buildings were gradually being released from civil defence restrictions. Even more than before, they appeared as foreign bodies and eerie monstrosities in the cityscape; their function seemed to have fallen out of time and no sensible person wanted to have anything to do with the murderous ideology they evoked, which had given rise to the buildings. "Never again war!" reads a graffiti on one of the bunkers photographed by Boris Becker. If we look at his objectively recorded photographic documents, we not only encounter unconventionally monstrous concrete buildings, but also learn about the extent of the related construction activities during the Second World War. Boris Becker has photographed around 700 bunkers in well over 40 West German cities. Boris Becker has based his series of works on a method that is related to the conceptual approach of the artist couple Bernd and Hilla Becher. The comparability of the pictures is just as intentional as a neutral point of view and a detailed and authentic-appropriate depiction of the building structure. The collection of pictures provides an exemplary view of a subject that was developed in many facets in the circle of the so-called Becher School and represented an essential starting point for Boris Becker's further work with the medium of photography. Since then, his attention has focussed on architecture, landscape, objects and still lifes as well as the complex central question of the reality behind the visually perceptible.

Exhibition en:
The Photographic Collection/ SK Stiftung Kultur, Cologne, 6/9/2019 - 9/2/2020
Saarlandmuseum - Modern Gallery, Saarbrücken, 18/7/2020 - 31/1/2021