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RICHARD BALLARIAN
American, born 1928

 

Richard Ballarian Unique Prints

Mr. Ballarian's prints use techniques he has developed since 1995. The colors and the print's painted look in these silver gelatin (black and white) papers is a result of normal darkroom printing: exposure (multiple), developer bath, fixing, wash, toning and rewashing. Some toner baths and delays (oxygenation) have given these prints coloration.

"A majority of these pictures record a passage in time, which we might call movement. The camera records this mutability in a way no person can visualize.
Other pictures propose a view that meets the eye before the mind can impose, on the scene, our cultures geometry. And some can only be explained by the magic of symmetry."

Richard Ballarian

 

Biography

 

1928

Born Pittsford, NY, a suburb of Rochester.
At fifteen Richard had a tiny darkroom under the back stairs where he enlarged snapshots.
1946-1950

University of Rochester, studied physics. Graduated 1950.
1950-1953

Military service, Navy.
1953-1956

Art Center School, Los Angeles. Journalism major.
1956

Moved to New York city.
Photographed model composite pictures and produced illustrative photos for artists. A no-pay assistant photographer job proved to be his first opportunity.
His pictures appear in a teen-age fashion magazine published by Dell. Works for Ingenue magazine.
1963 Works for Gentleman's Quarterly.
1966   Opens a photo studio in New York City, works with Woman's Day, Seventeen, Lady's Home Journal.
The book "Diary of a Century", with photographs by Jacques Henri Lartigue, is a revelation. Trip to Paris in 1973.
1974   Returns to Paris. Works with Elle and Depeche Mode.
Richard moves to Paris definitively and works until the mid 1990s for many fashion magazines and clients throughout Europe.
1994   Personal work with series of collages of architectural subjects: the 59th Street Bridge, the Louvre, Ruhr valley steel mills, Greek antiquities in Sicily...
1997-2003   Begins reworking earlier images in the darkroom, where the Urban Man series is born (People crossing the Champs-Elysees.) Starts unique print project inspired by Sigmar Polke's photographic manipulation work. Darkroom work is the central creative focus of new work. Printing manipulation generates the unique print series, and an admiration for Anselm Kiefer's use of photography.
    In 2000, Richard travels to Egypt in January and March. Urban Car series (2001.) Works on Paper Show, Park Avenue Armory, New York. New work, unique prints from the Urban Man series (2002-2003).
     

Exhibitions

2000 – 2003

Unique prints from the Urban Man, Egypt and the Urban Car series. Works on Paper, The Park Ave. Armory, New York.
Jan. 2000

Urban Man series, L.A. 2000 Photography Fair.

Oct. 1999

New work (unique prints,) 19th Century Photography LLC., at the New York Photography Fair, Puck building , New York.

Oct. 1998

First unique prints exhibited at the New York Photography Fair, Puck building. New York. Large collage of the Louvre (24"x 40".) Represented by 19th Century Photography LLC.

 

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