Über dieses Produkt

Product Identifiers

PublisherAbrams, Inc.

ISBN-100810958864

ISBN-139780810958869

eBay Product ID (ePID)43755641

Product Key Features

Book TitleMrs. Ballard's Parrots

Number of Pages96 Pages

LanguageEnglish

TopicTopic / Animals, Theater / Stagecraft & Scenography, Birds, Subjects & Themes / Plants & Animals, Animals / Birds, Decorative Arts

Publication Year2005

IllustratorYes

GenrePets, Design, Nature, Performing Arts, Photography, Humor

AuthorArne Svenson

FormatHardcover

Dimensions

Item Height0.5 in

Item Weight18.6 Oz

Item Length9.2 in

Item Width8.4 in

Additional Product Features

Intended AudienceTrade

LCCN2004-023436

Dewey Edition22

Grade FromEighth Grade

Grade ToCollege Graduate Student

Dewey Decimal779/.092

SynopsisIn the late 1960s, Alba Ballard, a Long Island housewife, decided it would be a cute idea to dress up one of her many pet parrots in a little costume. She sewed a tiny outfit, attached snaps to the back, and slipped it onto one of the birds. Delighted with the results, Alba began creating increasingly detailed costumes for her always available and willing subjects. Soon she began staging elaborate theatrical productions, casting her costumed parrots in scene reenactments from popular movies, TV shows, historical events, and 1970s popular culture. Her husband, Marvin, would assist in creating sets and props and would photograph the productions at Alba's direction. The resulting imagery from this collaboration among wife, husband, and parrots is a look into the highly creative mind of Alba Ballard. Untrained as an artist, she nevertheless was able to create works that embodied her fantasies, her humor, and her passions. And what fantasies she had! In her world, parrots became tiny, winged, overdressed incarnations of such luminaries as Sonny and Cher, Liberace, and General George Patton. Yellow and green macaws rode around on little motorcycles dressed in leather jackets reenacting scenes from Easy Rider and, changing costumes, could then effortlessly slip into roles from TV's Batman and Robin, The Dean Martin Show, and a commercial for Soft and Dry deodorant. Eventually, Alba and her feathered cast appeared on the David Letterman Show, Saturday Night Live, and even in Woody Allen's feature film Broadway Danny Rose. Very few of the photographs that Alba and Marvin created are still in existence, and sadly, Alba passed away in 1994. However, in 1992, a small collection of these photographs was discovered in the Swiss home of Elizabeth Taylor. Just after their discovery, the photographs reached the hands of photographer and author Arne Svenson, who has now gathered them together in this book. Book jacket.

LC Classification NumberTR729.B5.S85 2005