Visual perception emerges from intricate interactions among neuronal populations across the brain's sensory processing hierarchy. Neuronal correlations in the visual cortex can be modulated by both external visual stimuli and internal states. Recent studies emphasize the role of communication subspaces as a population-level routing mechanism that serve as “channels” for transmitting information, facilitating coordinated activity across brain areas (e.g., V1-V2) or between cortical layers (e.g., input-superficial). It is however not known if this co-ordinated activity has directed or shared origins. In this study, we investigated the inter-laminar communication in macaque V1 neural populations. Our findings reveal that layers interact through a low-dimensional subspace, whose structure is modulated by both visual stimuli and wakefulness states (eyes open/closed). Additionally, efficacy of the subspace is enhanced by visual stimulation and by eye-closing in the spontaneous period. Notably, the efficacy modulation due to visual stimulation is more prominent in the cross-layer direction, whereas efficacy modulation in the spontaneous period shows little direction preference. Furthermore, we found that evoked communication between input and superficial layers exhibits a time lag of approximately 10 milliseconds, which is absent without visual input. We conclude that co-ordinated activity during visual stimulation is due to directed communication, while that during wakefulness states of the spontaneous period is likely due to shared inputs.