Snapshots of life through an IAS officer's lens

An IAS officer and currently the additional divisional commissioner posted at Amravati, Maharashtra, N Nawin Sona, is so much more than his profession. He has been a photographer since the age of 15 and is soon coming up with his third photographic exhibition of 80 images titled Experimental Fine Art Photography.

Nawin believes that photography has actually helped him in his profession which in reality is poles apart from art. "It's because of photography that I have travelled to the interiors of the country and learned to appreciate the nuances of human life. It has helped me to perceive more than the obvious, which is really essential in a job like mine," says Nawin.
His current set of pictures is about the perception of the term 'real'. "There are different ways of looking at what's real around us. The pictures have been categorised into four interpretations of real," he says. The first category is titled Real and is about the obvious reality we see and perceive around us such as places, people and things.

The second and the third category of images are called Interstices I and II. Nawin explains, "These images are a little abstract and talk about spaces between things. Here I have captured recognisable spaces and objects that are always there but are never looked at with attention. It's like they are things and moments which are always lost in time. A pattern of waves, reflections on the surface of steel and the numerous windows of a building are just a few examples," he says.

The fourth category is titled Hyper-real. It depicts the other reality that humans have created through technology, television and the internet which actually is as good as the real one. "This is the condition in which if an object, event or phenomenon is not on television or the internet or if it is not written about, probably it does not exist. The hyper-real is that space of simulated images we live in, where the real which it seems to represent, may not be there at all. In this context, through deconstructing common images, I present a version to the viewer where the image seen is in its constituent parts such as RGB (red, green and blue) dots," says Nawin.

Keep a watch out for Nawin's photographic exhibition coming up in January next year at NCPA.