Photographs Become Pictures. The Becher Class

From April 27 to August 13, 2017, the Städel Museum is staging a comprehensive survey on the Becher Class at the Düsseldorf art academy and the major paradigm shift in the medium of artistic photography with which the Bechers and their students are associated. With the aid of some 200 photographs by Volker Döhne, Andreas Gursky, Candida Höfer, Axel Hütte, Tata Ronkholz, Thomas Ruff, Jörg Sasse, Thomas Struth and Petra Wunderlich—a group of whom some enjoy international renown and others are due for rediscovery—the exhibition will examine the influence exerted by Bernd and Hilla Becher on their students at the Düsseldorf school. What unites the students’ works with those of their teachers? How do they differ? Is there really such a thing as the “Becher School” or is it “merely” a matter of several highly successful photographers who happened to be studying at the “right place” at an especially propitious moment in history? And how have those artists influenced our present conception of what a picture is? Taking the artist duo’s work as a point of departure, the exhibition Photographs Become Pictures. The Becher Class will acquaint viewers with the radical changes in the  medium of artistic photography that became manifest in the works of the Becher pupils in the 1980s and above all the 90s, and investigate the art-historical impact of this development up to the very present. It will feature major large-scale works as well as key early endeavours by the members of what is presumably the most influential generation of German photographers in the field of fine art.

The students of the first in a long line of Becher Classes at the Düsseldorfer art academy introduced elementary changes to contemporary art’s aesthetic, media and economic contexts. They not only contributed decisively to shaping international photography in the 1990s, but also fundamentally redefined the status and perception of artistic photography in general. Their works can be considered as one of the most self-confident emancipations of photography as art in the mediums history, while at the same time reflecting the (not merely digital) moment when the boundaries between the media dissolve.

The presentation is being sponsored by the DZ BANK AG.

An interactive digitorial, elaborately designed to provide comprehensive insights into the exhibition, is available at becherklasse.staedelmuseum.de. 

Featured artists: Bernd and Hilla Becher, Volker Döhne, Andreas Gursky, Candida Höfer, Axel Hütte, Tata Ronkholz, Thomas Ruff, Jörg Sasse, Thomas Struth, Petra Wunderlich

Director: Dr. Philipp Demandt
Curator: Dr. Martin Engler
Co-Curator: Dr. Jana Baumann

Press contact: Axel Braun (Head of Press/Public Relations):
T (+49 69) 605098 170 / F (+49 69) 605098 188 / presse [​at​] staedelmuseum.de
Press material: click here