Property from the Collection of Henri van der Tol
Roger Ballen
Dresie and Casie, Twins, Western Transvaal, South Africa
Lot Closed
November 13, 01:58 PM GMT
Estimate
7,000 - 10,000 EUR
Lot Details
Description
Roger Ballen
b. 1950
Dresie and Casie, Twins, Western Transvaal, South Africa
signed, titled, dated 1993 (on the reverse)
gelatin silver print
35.9 by 36.2 cm.
14⅛ by 14¼ in.
Executed in 1993 and printed in 1996, this work is one of 5 signed prints outside of the edition of 35.
Melkweg Galerie, Amsterdam
Acquired from the above by the present owner
Roger Ballen, Ballenesque: Roger Ballen - A Retrospective, New York 2017, p. 109, illustrated
Of this work, Roger Ballen wrote, 'This is the image that I will probably be most remembered for. Millions of people have seen it; few have forgotten it. For some unknown reason, it is able penetrate the inner mind and lodge itself there. Why and how the human brain responds to this image in this way remains a mystery' (Ballenesque, p. 108). The present photograph is from a long sold-out edition.
Dresie and Casie, Twins, Western Transvaal, South Africa belongs to an early body of work in which Ballen documented impoverished white communities living on the fringes of South African society. The powerful portrait pays tribute to a group of people the apartheid government tried to hide as it highlighted the failures of its system. The image also represents a crucial turning point in Ballen’s development as an artist, moving away from documentary photography in favour of psychological portraiture. Roger Ballen stopped making gelatin silver prints in 2015.
