RB: No, I don't think it really had anything to do with too much about America. In fact, at the time when I moved here, I was sort of not really comfortable in the States. You know, I went to University of California, Berkeley in the late 60s, early 70s, during the counterculture. There was a lot of anti-Vietnam and anti-establishment type of thinking. I think I was sort of alienated from America. And then I made these long trips – I hitchhiked from Cairo to Cape Town in 74, then I hitchhiked from Istanbul to New Guinea two years after that, did my first photo book, and then went back to America and did this PhD in geology. But, I think I came back here probably for two or three reasons. One, it was a great place to work and as a geologist, it was a very wealthy country with a lot of potential here, so it was a great environment. Secondly, I married a South African woman.

And thirdly, even though they had it apartheid, I'd like this sort of – and this doesn't exist in the United States – I liked the relationship between this sort of more so-called third world, the first world, and the colonial world. Those dynamics don't really exist in the United States. And now it's really an African country in all ways, many, many ways. It's not like America. This is not America here.

PM: Yeah.Yeah, that's true.

RB: It was more of a British colony than an American one. If you had to say what is it more like, it was more like a British colony in the beginning than something out of a...

PM: Yeah, no, certainly. I did grow up in Little England, where I lived at the time. For me, it's probably more to do with the actual landscape and the small towns and stuff. But I just wanted to quickly ask you about the counterculture issue. Do you think that you remain part of the counterculture?

RB: Look, there are a lot of things that counterculture influenced me in a lot of ways. It made me feel like the individual rather than the group or the country was more important. It was something that I had...it was a period when you were sort of trying to figure out who you were. It was very much a psychological journey about the culture we're living in, as well as a psychological journey about the self. And my first degree was in psychology. This was something that did have a big influence on me. There were a lot of other influences on me, but I think it did. I think I had a very good education in high school from 14 to 18. I read endless books. And also in college, I have

excellent education. When I started working as an artist and doing other things in my life, I was really well endowed with a very good education from science to literature to theater, psychology. And that, I think, laid the foundations for a lot of what I do. Just as a small point, my mother started one of the first photo galleries in the United States and worked for Magnum. So, as a child, I got to know all the famous photographers in the world, so you represented them. This had the most influence on me in terms of being a photographer. So, by the time I was 17 or 18, I could take good pictures.

PM: Did you actually meet them, the photographers? Wow!

RB: Yeah, all of them. I mean, my mother was the first person to work with Gutej as a gallery in America. Cartier-Bresson, Marc Ravoux, Bruce Davidson, Elliot Irwin. All the people that were famous at the time. My mother was involved with them one way or another. I mean, they weren't her best friends and they weren't interested in me. But I did meet with them and I saw them and they gave my mother pictures and books, all these books and pictures all over the house. And my mother was passionate about it.

Then I, just by looking at the stuff, got to understand what the best photography at the time was. And so when I went out and tried to emulate them, I was on another level, because I was looking at this stuff for five, 10 years before I went out and tried to take my own pictures.

PM: So I was going to ask you to what extent do you think you were influenced by those photographers? You've clearly answered that, but I do want to ask you to what extent you have also been influenced by fine art movements like Dadaism and outsiderism and, you know, Art Brut, and so on? Are those things that just kind of happened organically in your work or are they references?

RB: Well, I think, initially they didn't have that much influence on me because I didn't study art. I had no background in art. I wasn't that interested in art. So, you know, I don't think it had a huge impact on me. So later on, you know, when I started to find my own path and maybe some way, one way or another, there were references, you could say that the wires in the pictures could have something to do with Monroe, some of the existential angst in the pictures of something new, Bacon. And I, and I like, I like seeing cave paintings. So, you know, all these things had some sort of impact, but they're all mixed up in your mind. And then, you have...you see all this stuff, but then you go out and take a picture and try to take a picture. And then it's meaningless. It doesn't, you know, where, where did this picture come from? Did it come from Bacon? Did it come from the place? Did it come from the rat?

Where did it come from? How did you do these things? The way it came from is like layers, like geology, layer on layer, layer, layer, layer, layer of work, years and years of hard work, passion, commitment, and probably a brain for it. So that's where it came from. It was built on my own journey over decades. That's where it came from.

PM: I've always been fascinated by the fact that you're a geologist and I think also a mineral economist. For me, it's kind of like an obvious allegory of layers and time and so on. But what led you from psychology to geology?

RB: I think the thing is, I didn't really want to work at all as a psychologist. That psychology thing was part of the counterculture phenomenon of getting to know yourself. But when I finished that degree, I really wasn't interested in working as a psychologist. I had no interest in it. I like the outdoors. I like to travel. I like nature. So I thought geology was the good profession to do that with.

PM: Over the years, your method has kind of shifted. I mean, I don't think it's changed. I still see you as essentially the same artist as working within the same kind of register. But was there a specific moment when you realised that you were moving away from pure documentary and toward more kind of fictionalised or constructed images?

RB: I think around ’97, ’98. So, Platteland, which was a very famous project, was really a documentary. Even though you could see parts of my style in that, it was still somewhat documentary. Outland was the next project. That was a five-year project between 95 and 2000. Beginning in 95, all my pictures to the present are in and around Johannesburg. And I started somewhere around 97 or so, started to work almost like a theater director. started to change the background, change the foreground, tell somebody to bring their pet rat in or do this or do that. Or maybe I made a scribble on the wall with wires. I used to work with wires. Before, there was a lot of drawing in the pictures I used to draw. In Outland, you can see almost all the pictures have wires in them. And wires were almost like a way of drawing. And so, somewhere around 97, 98, I started to take control of the situation, of the aesthetic, and started to build on my own impulses, rather than necessarily trying to make a statement about the people, the place, the culture, and all these things. Then it sort of became my head space and that was about 1997. And so, if you look at the Outland book, you'll see that the early ones feel a little bit like Platteland and the later ones feel a little bit more like the Ballenesque.

PM: So, I remember at the time, you know, some people kind of critiqued that. And I don't think they recognised the extent to which you were happy to have that seem intentional, you know, as part of the work. But, some people said that it was constructed and because it was constructed, because you'd interfered in an image, it was somehow inauthentic. Which I think is a very false logic. But my question is, was your move towards more and more assemblies, more interference – not interference, that's not the right word – but was your move towards greater degrees of assembly in any way a response to your critics or was it just something you would have done anyway?

RB: It would happen, layer by layer by layer. And so, you know, it wasn't...I think the only thing that...the main change for me, during this period beginning about 2000, the human face started to disappear. And one of the reasons the human face started to disappear was when people look at a photograph, it's like when you see a person, the first thing you do is you look at their face, you don't look at their shoes. So the face became an impediment to the formal qualities of my work. Nobody has to...they weren't worried about the wire, the background, the foreground. Is that person poor? Did you get permission? What did he think? Did you give him the picture? So you get those types of comments. And there was much more complexity in the work than the person. So once that face went away, they don't ask those kinds of questions. It becomes a more complex ambiguity for people to recognise. And I think when people criticise the work, whether it was in the Platteland series, the documentary period, or later on, usually the more they criticise it, the more it has affected their state of being, the more it's like a defense mechanism. So in fact, they're really projecting their own anxieties, internal anxieties, on me, because they can't contend with the issues that the pictures bring up, whether it's conscious issues or subconscious issues. So the more they struggle, as far as I'm concerned, the more the noose gets tighter around their neck.

PM: Yeah. So I spent a bit of time reading some of those reviews this weekend. And it was really interesting because, specifically one review, they kind of said maybe it's exploitative, but actually it's not exploitative because he does engage with his subject. And they're not just pieces of furniture. But then in terms of representation, it feels exploitative. And I could just feel this person just kind of, you know, wrapping themselves in their own words, because they couldn't get past that discomfort that they feel with people who are not...

RB: They're ideologically rigid, and the pictures attack their subconscious state of being, and they can't handle that. That's it. It's as clear as...I've been doing this for like decades. I know all the issues – I've been dealing with this for like so many years. So I know how to deal with it. I mean, it's clear. It's projecting their state of internal anxiety. That's all it is. And it shows their rigid ego.

I'm not saying, and you can't...and you can't...I mean, today, just today, I got like 10 messages from people from Outland wishing my wife a happy Mother's Day. So what are you talking about that I'm doing this or that to these people? These are my best friends here.

And I help a lot of people. Don't think I just don't sit and take pictures. I've helped hundreds and hundreds of people in my life. So you're telling me that I'm exploiting somebody's calling me up to wish my wife happy Mother's Day. You must be out of your mind.

PM: Yeah. For me, I don't know you very well, but getting to know you a little bit a long time ago, it was very evident that you were not separate from the world that you were photographing, you know, even if you're economically separate.

RB: You can't do things like this. You know, those places are...you come from here, these places are dangerous. They're not...people are having problems with their lives, and unstable. They have no money. And there I'm sitting, with a car and a camera going there with...I'm not a world karate champion. I'm not carrying an AK-47. And I'm in the place where 50, 60 people are hungry,

and having difficult lives, with a camera and taking pictures. And doing this for year after year. You can't do this unless there's a trust there. You can't do it. You will be killed. You come from here, you know the problems. It's evident, it's evident, it's evident. A lot of people call me uncle and father, by the way.

PM: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think either middle-class critics or those middle-class people can get very confused about agency. And I often felt that their critiques of your work were far more condescending to your subjects than they were accusing you of being. Because it presumes that only middle-class people have agency and autonomy.

RB: A lot of it has to do with the political ideology more than anything else. I mean, the people I take the pictures of love the photographs. So they love the pictures. What's wrong with that? You don't like it? Somebody thinks negatively of them. The people who got the picture love the picture and put it next to their bed and thank me profusely. So, you know, the whole thing is full of garbage.

Look at the TV, look at every day in the newspaper, what they're showing. What are you talking about? And what did you eat tonight? Did you kill something? What are you doing with your car? You're polluting the environment. You're a big hypocrite.

PM: Yeah, I think it's interesting that people don't make the same critiques of Hollywood films in the same way. I was thinking of David Lynch.

RB: They worship...you're making a very good point. All over the world, it's part of human biology to worship celebrity, more deeply than you think. You can see that on Instagram – one of the most interesting things about Instagram, you scroll through it, when the movie star comes up or the great athlete comes up, they get hundreds of thousands of likes. It could be the most stupid photograph you've ever seen, but boy, they get hundreds of thousands of likes.

That's the way the human brain is structured. And it's not so simple to just say, stupid Hollywood. It's everywhere. Everywhere in the world, I've seen this. And sometimes I'm a celebrity. I can see it when I go to certain places. I'm like a celebrity. And people can't wait to have their picture taken with me. It's part of human nature.

PM: Yeah, I totally. get it. Back to the images themselves – I'm fascinated by mark making, you know, beyond your work. It's just these little messages that are, especially Durban, you know, in back alleys, on the side of bridges, just these often incredibly beautiful images. And it's a technique that traverses fine art across the spectrum, but it does have a particular resonance in marginal spaces.

So can we just talk a little bit about what attracted you to this kind of strange subconscious language that you've kind of incorporated into your work?

RB: Yeah, I guess it's the subconscious mind writing. It's like a cave painting, you know. It's like the subconscious mind, somehow or other exposing itself. I don't know.

What's interesting for me personally is that my drawings now and the way I draw look now like the same thing I did when I was five years old. So it's a very deep expression, a mental way of how the brain works with the hand and the eye. This is a ‘Roger Mark’. It didn't advance in a lot of ways to become like a Picasso Mark. It stayed the same for 70 years.

PM: Yeah!

RB: And this is what's interesting to me, and what's equally interesting, which is very important, in the photographs, sometimes the drawings are all mine. Sometimes they're all one other person, sometimes there are 10 other people. Sometimes they were there already. And what is important is that the aesthetic of the drawing has to be a reflection of my aesthetic. I'm just writing something for an art group museum today about how you can't distinguish my drawings from somebody else's on the wall. There has to be that coherence. And if there wasn't that coherence, the pictures wouldn't work. If Picasso drew the drawings on the wall, the photographs wouldn't work. There's a harmony between the drawings and the other things in the picture.

PM: Yeah. What I find so interesting about that very specific language is that, beyond the kind of signifiers, beyond the actual content, that the style of that kind of quick drawing seems almost universal – obviously when people are trained it starts to fade – but it does seem like a human kind of language that transcends actual language.

RB: Yeah. It's like a cave drawing, a child's drawing, something like this. It's a fundamental way of expressing one's self. It's a primal way of expressing one's self. And yeah, you're right, I think you're right. And then the challenge is then to integrate the act of drawing with the act of photography.

PM: So, you speak about how you are taking self-portraits of yourself, in a sense. All of your photographs are pictures of Roger Ballen. I do get that. I think that, in a sense, is true of every photographer; it's just that sometimes, we reveal less or more of ourselves. But my question is: to what extent do you think that you are also exploring a universal subconscious, rather than just your own?

RB: Well, again, this is a very, very complicated issue, the issue of archetypes. What's an archetype? What's social? What's primal? I've been thinking about this for a long time. And so, I guess the only issue would be that...it goes back to your first question, you know, like something that sticks, and sticks for a time.

And then if the art has an ability to stick for a time, and that the person viewing the picture has no idea who you are, where the picture was taken, but somehow another walks away with the picture, then that picture might have an archetypal meaning to it.

I always bring up this one analogy, which I like to bring up. For many years when I took my pictures, I carried this very heavy – I think I couldn't do it anymore, I was younger – this heavy metal box with pictures in it; it was pretty heavy. So when I went through the Johannesburg airport and they put it through the x-ray machine, they couldn't see anything inside. When they opened up that box, the people at security went crazy when they saw those pictures. "That looks like a ghost. Where did you take that? This is strange. This is going to give me this". They didn't even know they were photographs. They had no background in photography. That was a very interesting confirmation that the pictures had some sort of archetypal meaning.

PM: Yeah, that is interesting. What role do you think empathy plays in your photographs? Both in terms of your own empathy. and also the empathy of the people viewing your images.

RB: Yeah, but empathy is on a lot of levels. I'm empathetic towards the rats in my pictures. I'm empathetic towards the relationship with birds to the human catastrophe that exists outside. So you have to have a passion, have empathy. I have empathy with the people I work with. You know, empathy plays some role,I guess – there are a lot of animals in my pictures.

And what's always interesting, I'll bring up this point because it is a very important point. And again, it has no criticism of yourself, but it's a common issue. The questions are always about the people. It's never about the animals. In the last 25 years, there are 10 times more animals in the pictures than there are human beings. What about the birds? What do they think? Who are the birds? Why are they there? What is the relationship with them and me? What about the rats? Why do you hate the rats so much? What's wrong with the rats? What's your problem?

But this never comes up. It never comes up.

PM: I'm Yeah. Well, it actually really was legitimately my next question! (laughs)

RB: It's so interesting though. You see this in Johannesburg: "Lion bites toe of baby!" – It's all over the city. There's nothing about "50 lions were shot from hunters from Germany and Americans sent home in a packet."

PM: Yeah! you threw me a little bit there. But can we talk a little bit more about the animals and their consciousness?

RB: I like them. Yes, let's talk about them.

PM: Yeah, and also just about that disconnect between humans and animals, but also our relatedness. On some level, we can't, you know, engage with each other, but I do think our consciousnesses can intersect with each other, especially animals that we kind of know well, you know, if they are friends or, you know, semi-wild or whatever. How different do you think we really are from animals and also from each other?

RB: Look, most people in Western cultures judge the relationship between human and animals in the experience they have with their dog or their cat. They're totally alienated from nature and the real ultimate relationship, through evolutionary relationship and current relationship of nature to humanity.

So, you know, they're sitting and sending a dog to a psychologist for a thousand dollars an hour, and feeding it steak, and falling in love with the dog, and having the dog die, or the rat dies, having a psychological breakdown.

But the relationship is basically unharmonious. It's exploitative. It's destructive. It's clear. It's clear. And this comes...it's genetic....It's a genetic problem. It's not a cultural problem. It's a genetic problem that started thousands of years ago, because of the genetics of the human species and its need to survive. So we're not looking at something necessarily so cultural. There are obviously cultural aspects, some places may be more destructive than others, because they can control certain things. But it's a human nature problem that pervades the planet. I don't think there's any solution.