Today is Makar Sankaranthi. It marks the day the Sun starts moving from the South to the North, and coincides with its transition from the zodiac of Sagittarius (dhanu) to Capricorn (makara). Dedicated to the Sun, the day is observed across India in many different ways, but all signifying thanks-giving and a new beginning.
Kite-flying marks the day, especially in Gujarat. The sky is full of colour, with myriad shapes and sizes of kites, and fierce battles to bring down opponents’ kites.
Since media is full of reports of kites, kite-festivals and other sundry related topics, I thought I would mark Sankaranthi by writing about another flying object which is used to denote joy and celebration—balloons!
Definitionally, a balloon is a flexible membrane bag. It is inflated using a gas. At the most basic level, it is about filling it with as much air as our lung-power allows. But otherwise, a range of gases is used– helium, hydrogen, nitrous oxide, oxygen etc. Balloons can also be filled with smoke, liquid water, small solids like sand, flour or rice.
Though in everyday life, we go out to buy balloons for birthdays, parties and events, the rubber balloon was invented for scientific experiments by the great scientist Michael Faraday in 1824. He came out with these for use in the lab for experiments with various gases.
Even today, apart from their use in fun and games and as decoration, more serious uses include meteorology, medical treatment, military defence, or transportation. The fact that a balloon is low cost and has a low density, makes it useful in several situations.
The use of balloons for decoration has extended into balloon modelling or balloon twisting where special balloons are twisted into various shapes, often animals, by artists called twisters, balloon benders or balloon artists.
Balloon or Inflatable Art museums and exhibitions too dot the world. Artists who work with this medium are fascinated with the concept of how the air element can fill various shapes. They translate this fascination into installations, inflatable sculptures, interactive and digital artworks.
Prime among these is Balloon Museum– a curatorial team that designs contemporary art exhibitions with specific works in which ‘air’ is a distinctive element. Their ‘The Pop Air Tour’, with the tagline ‘Art is Inflatable’ has been travelling across Europe. It has several immersive exhibits: ‘A Quiet Strom’ in which infinite white spheres fall to the ground, as tiny soap bubbles caress the audience. ‘Aria’, a ‘digital interpretation of inflatable art in which the visitor finds himself enveloped, in a tight space, surrounded by a multitude of balloons lost in the sky, involving visitors in the journey through the metaphysical experience of suspension. This exhibit like many others has immersive sound design ‘intended to bring back in sound the sensations created around the visitors with the same intensity and depth of a breath taken miles high with the unique intention of experiencing a space without limits.’ Apart from these serious exhibits, there are also fun ones like the independent inflatable maze, and The Goof — an entourage of inflatable Monsters that are taking over the world, but how they got here and what their motives are is unknown!
The US has its share of Balloon Museums, including the Anderson Abruzzo International Balloon Museum Foundation with a ‘mission to uplift’!
So this Sankaranthi, let us be uplifted along with the kites (or balloons), pay homage to the Sun, and wish for a healthy, happy, prosperous year for all!
–Meena
Millennial Matriarchs 