# The Theatre of Apparitions

Canonical: https://www.bookquiver.com/roger-ballen/the-theatre-of-apparitions

![The Theatre of Apparitions](https://quivercdn.com/covers/thames-and-hudson/roger-ballen/the-theatre-of-apparitions_978-05-0054-464-8.jpg?v=2026-07-14%2020%3A24%3A36)

- Authors: [Roger Ballen](https://www.bookquiver.com/roger-ballen)
- Language: en_GB
- Published: 2016-09-29

## Description

With a career spanning over four decades, Roger Ballen is best known for his psychologically powerful and masterfully composed images that exist in a space between painting, drawing, installation and photography. This book 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', these Ballenesque images take readers on a journey deep into their subconscious. Inspired by the sight of hand-drawn carvings on blacked-out windows 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 results 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 otherwordly, physical and spiritual, his work transcends all traditional concepts of photography.

## Editions

### The Theatre of Apparitions

- Publisher: thames_and_hudson
- ISBN: 978-05-0054-464-8
- Pages: 192
- Published: 2016-09-29
- Language: en_GB