Pins and portraits

It’s addictive and it gets him on his knees. Nason Ponniah tells RACHAEL PHILIP what started him on the art of using pins to create pictures of famous personalitie

WE are advised to keep our shoes on. There are tiny pins everywhere, cautions Nason Ponniah.

Although we do not see any scattered on the floor or on the sofa, we do find a tight bunch in a deep basin, some in a tray while gazillions are stuck on a portrait of the late Tan Sri Lim Goh Tong. Rather, they make up his face.

Against a thin black rubber sheet, his pin-pricked portrait has a certain dignity and eminence, tough to bring out if your chosen medium is oil or watercolour as, when they catch the light, the tiny pinheads literally make his face and bald head glow.

At the nose area, the pins are only half depressed. It gradually eases at the sides to enhance the 3D representation of his image.

The same technique is used for other parts of the face. The brow furrows broodingly while his eyes sit on tired bags. The zig zag of his tie, meanwhile, looks silky and rich.

Nason, 54, is a real estate agent by day and a comedian by night. His performances are peppered with excellent impersonations of politicians like Tun Mahathir Mohamad, Tun Dr Ling Liong Sik and Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu.

But whatever free time he has between selling property and cracking people up, is put aside for pin art. He has been doing this for over 20 years.

“Take it out into the sun,” he tells us. So we move the unwieldy portrait weighing over 10kg out onto his apartment balcony. It literally glows in the afternoon sun.

To date, Nason has created hundreds of pieces of pin