Roger Ballen is best known for his psychologically powerful and intricately layered images that exist in a space between painting, drawing, installation and photography.
The Theatre of Apparitions is both a departure from his existing oeuvre and the culmination of his unique aesthetic linking image-making and theatrical performance. Separated into seven chapters or ‘acts’, with each one introduced by a text written by the photographer, these ‘Ballenesque’ images take readers on a journey deep into their subconscious.
Initially inspired by blacked-out windows seen in an abandoned women’s prison, Ballen started to experiment using different spray paints on glass and then ‘drawing on’ or removing the paint with a sharp object to let natural light through. The resulting images are like prehistoric cave-paintings: the black, dimensionless spaces on the glass are canvases onto which Ballen carves his thoughts and emotions. Fossil-like facial forms and dismembered body parts co-exist uncomfortably with vaporous, ghost-like shadows – these images have the capacity to shock, inspire, amuse and even elate viewers.
Timeless and innovative, earthly and otherworldly, physical and spiritual, this work transcends all traditional concepts of photography. |