Balaji Ponna

“About his work Balaji says “it's a matter of playing with certain notions that the society and people carry. My present series of work is about that, but executed in a humorous mode. I tried to build compatibility between my language and the ideas that circulated around it. Here title becomes one of the primary constitutional and conceptual elements of any work. The visual and its verbal supplement are simultaneously conceived. This makes the process more interesting and challenging”.

His work revolves around the concept of patriotism with a stroke of sly humour which has been an intrinsic part of his work. Ponna's works also deal with popular anxiety to interpret nationalism in the contemporary times and contemporary crisis surrounding the idea of nation. His work is both visual and textual where the text is often the source of the imagery which is dominantly attractive and visually engaging. Balaji Ponna's work is a process of reimaging the nation today and questioning the very Bourgeoisie concept of national boundaries asking for a space free from restrictions and borders”. V. Divakar (see biography)