Like the images of pitheads in this display, these photographs of coal bunkers form part of the ongoing documentation of industrial architecture by the husband and wife team Bernd and Hilla Becher. The coal bunkers were located in Germany, France and Britain. One of the impulses motivating the Bechers was a desire to preserve a record of a vanishing industrial landscape. Within a few years of completing this work, almost all of the structures had been demolished. The photographs seem to highlight the abstract shapes of the buildings, which the Bechers have suggested have a sculptural quality.