St. Moritz Art Masters, held in Switzerland from August 26 th to September 3rd, launched this year its 10th edition. Once more this annual art festival was the highlight of the summer program in St. Moritz, not only offering an extensive art program, but also providing a multifaceted platform for creative and professional encounters. Renowned South-African photographer Roger Ballen exhibits at Swiss venue Galerie Karsten Greve.
The mesmerizing imagery created by self-taught photographer Roger Ballen, who carries a PhD in geology and was born in New York in 1950, are the result of meticulously arranging countless elements by strategically installing them like props on a stage. Human protagonists, whose often unconventional appearance is showcased prominently and is further emphasized by the derelict housing surrounding them, are integrated into multi-layered scenarios.
Within them Ballen seeks to uncover – akin to the way the Surrealist movement’s écriture automatique sought to grasp unpredictable mental dynamics – the chaos of the condition humaine without transcribing it into any type of logical framework. “The images I create, I create not to inform”, he says. “They are much rather meant to be understood as a coherent commentary on the chaos in our incomprehensible world… If I could attach any meaning to the images, they would be nothing more than simple photographs.”
Roger Ballen
August 21 – September 3, 2017
Galerie Karsten Greve
Via Maistra 4
7500 St. Moritz
Switzerland
www.galerie-karsten-greve.com
