With Ritratti di fabbriche, this was the image for the cover of the first 1981 edition of the book, Gabriele Basilico - who had also made a name for himself with reportage-style works such as ‘Dancing in Emilia’ - gained great attention from critics for his important reflection on the era of deindustrialisation. Shot in Milan with a Nikon camera equipped with an off-center lens and the discipline that comes from his training as an architect, this work recalls the aesthetics dear to Hilla and Bernd Becher, masters of the Düsseldorf Academy. When in 1991 he was commissioned to document the damage of fifteen years of war inflicted on Beirut before its reconstruction, Basilico was already working at the view camera, focusing on the ruins but hinting, in the perspectives glimpsed, the possibilities of a rebirth. What emerges here is that rigorous vision and ability to interpret the landscape in more humanistic terms that remain the fundamental characteristics of his style.