Pooja completed her BFA from Andhra University, Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh in 2018 and MFA from MS University, Vadodara, Gujarat in printmaking in 2020. She was the runner-up at “Indian Printmaker House” in 2021. She has participated in various workshops and residencies, including Space Studio Baroda Residency in 2021 and the Student Biennale in association with Kochi–Muziris Biennale, Visakhapatnam.
Pooja’s etchings refuse to be burdened by gravity or a single perspective, whether it is her faceless series or her bazaar-scapes. She wishes to memorialize the life of street vendors, who are otherwise invisibilised by us, camouflaging the cityscapes. She creates a world of fantasy that allows for deep introspection. Building on her observational sketches of people, faces and their public lives, she taxidermies their memories through the laborious process of etchings, bringing to life an upside-down world, where people are often defined by their belongings. She engages with the perplexities of city life, and the chaos that surrounds us, her repetitive strokes reinforcing the internal conflicts of her subjects. Locating and In Search of, both are extensions of her fascination by the “bazaar” with hawkers, vendors, wanderers. She painstakingly attempts to capture their routines and practices. With keen interest in the rhythm of the daily cycle, Pooja’s aims to foreground the centrality of these workers in the functioning of city life.