ROGER BALLEN "BOARDING HOUSE" ART PHOTOGRAPHY BOOK IN SOUTH AFRICA

Roger Ballen "Boarding House" Art Photography Book, BRAND NEW, STILL WRAPPED IN PLASTIC “It is difficult to explain this place except that I think it exists in some way or another in most people’s mind.” – Roger Ballen Roger Ballen’s photographs are like images from a waking dream: compelling and thought-provoking, with layers of rich details, flashes of dark humor, and an altered sense of place. Blurring the boundaries between documentary photography and art, his work is both a powerful social statement and a complex psychological study. Roger Ballen's a new collection showcasing over 70 black and white images, mostly unpublished, this is Ballen’s most formally sophisticated work to date. The tableaux have a greater emphasis on drawn and sculptural elements, and the sense of collaboration between the artist and his subjects is increasingly relevant. An introductory essay by photography curator David Travis addresses the work in an accessible way, looking at these images in the wider context of Ballen’s career.   Boarding House  is a space of transient residence, of comings and goings, of people sheltered in a place they are using for their immediate survival. Basic and fundamental, the structure is furnished with objects necessary for an elementary existence, decorated with evocative drawings, and littered throughout with animals. Remnants function there as physical symbols of events that have occurred in the space; broken pieces of a functional reality exist as the leftovers of scenarios that have been played out there. The altered sense of place of this temporary abode creates a sense of alienation, which acts as a jumping off point for the imagination to run wild.