Madras, India, 1973. Lives and works in Bangalore.

For a few years now, Krishnaraj Chonat has been examining the middle-class fascination with high style interiors as status symbols, an aspiration molded by a typically urban consumerist ethos. Another leitmotif in his work is his long standing concern

for the environment and the impending ecological disasters awaiting mankind. Chonat’s work strikes a fine balance between aesthetic beauty and an evocative lyricism offset by an excessive, superficial splendor typical of competitive consumerist market aesthetics. As an artistic device, this amalgamation of the two devices is seamless, while successfully revealing the crude hollowness of the commercial stereotype. (Martha Jakimowicz)

Represented by: Gallery Ske, Bangalore; Jack Tilton Gallery, New York; Marella Gallery, Milan/Beijing.

Image: Private Sky, 2007. Mixed media, 160 x 129 x 51 cm. Gallery Ske, Bangalore.