Bryn Colton/Getty ImagesIn February, the Met revealed Ballard’s “The Garden of Time” as the theme for tonight's red carpet. In the “Garden of Time,” Count Axel and his wife live in a grand villa with a sprawling walled estate. A crystalline meadow of glass-like “time flowers” spring out across the plot, while over the horizon, a whip-yielding angry mob inches closer and closer. Even if you don’t recognize his name, you are likely to have come across Ballard’s unnerving musings on human psychology. But it’s not just film — Ballard's worldview has infiltrated art, music, architecture and fashion, perhaps more consistently than any other 20th-century author.

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Persons: Ballard, Bryn Colton, Ballard’s, Count Axel, Axel, —, Steven Spielberg’s, David Cronenberg’s, it’s Locations: Shepperton , England, British, France