Boarding House

Boarding House

Roger Ballen • Phaidon

ISBN-10: 0714857777 · ISBN-13: 978‑0714857770 · 2009 · 1st Edition

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Completeness 45

Cover quality: low resolution

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A unique opportunity to own a limited edition silver gelatin print by Roger Ballen Boarding House captures an imaginary space of transient residence, of comings and goings, focusing on the evocative drawings and sculptural objects as well as the people and animals found there captures an imaginary space of transient residence, of comings and goings, focusing on the evocative drawings and sculptural objects as well as the people and animals found there. Roger Ballen's (b.1950) work focuses on a strange and alluring place that he calls the Boarding House, where he directs his subjects in a unique collaboration of imagination and reality. Toying with fantasy, Ballen's transient compositions create a question mark over our preconceptions of photography, creating a theatre out of the building blocks of documentary. The motifs of childhood take on new identities in the nightmarish world of the Boarding House - a toy giraffe lies beheaded, while a clear-eyed puppy chews at the foot of a doll face down in the dirt. Amidst this squalor and chaos Ballen's creation is meticulously framed so that the young child on its periphery becomes almost secondary.

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