Konrad Helbig traveled the classic Mediterranean countries from the 1950’s to the 1980’s, capturing in his pictures the architecture, the works of art and the landscapes, but above all the inhabitants of the regions, he traveled through. Fascinated by the beauty of male youth, Helbig photographed generations of "ragazzi", mostly fishermen and sailors from the coastal villages of Sicily. Only after his death in Mainz in 1986 were the nude photographs of young men discovered in his estate. Posthumously published illustrated books put these photographs into the tradition of Wilhelm von Gloeden and Wilhelm Plüschow, or rather see them as an anticipation of a photographic perspective of, for example, Bruce Weber or Herb Ritts.