Powerful portrait impresses judges

POSTED March 7 2024 , News

We are thrilled to share that a recent Old Girl’s artwork is in the running to win one of Western Australia’s most prestigious portraiture awards, the 2024 Lester Prize Youth Award.

Sophia Fuzikova (’23) impressed the judging panel with her emotive portrait, Maame Nsuyaa (We Are Who We Were), a portrait of her great-grandmother.

The portrait, which Sophia produced as part of her Year 12 ATAR studies, seeks to honour a woman who not only raised nine children on a cocoa farm as a widow but also championed the importance of education to her family.

Sophia said, “The inspiration of my artwork is my great-grandmother, Maame Nsuyaa. She is sitting on a porch at her cocoa farm in Ghana. She was a young widow who raised nine children while running a Cocoa farm all on her own. Her dedication to her family allowed my grandmother, Comfort Afrifa, to move away from the farm to Accra, the capital city of Ghana. It was a difficult decision, but one that provided an opportunity for my mum, Narkie Tetteh, to receive a good education and move to Australia, where I was born. This piece is a commentary on the independence and strength of the women before me.

“My painting techniques were influenced by Nigerian artist, Njideka Akunyili. She combines collage and paint to explore patterns and dimensions in her works. My great-grandmother is seated in a chair, wearing a collaged dress with a collage of photos on the door beside her. I have utilised Akunyili’s signature collage and exploration of patterns to delve into the cultural and significant patterns and images from my Ghanaian heritage.

“My great-grandmother’s dress is a fabric collage of ‘kente’ cloth, a traditional Ghanaian textile, made of handwoven cloth, strips of silk and cotton. This represents the connection between my ancestors and my own present – our stories have been woven in one dress. On the wall behind my great-grandmother is an image collage collected from my family’s photo album. The wall is symbolic of our connections with each other. It displays different people from many walks of life, all united on one slate.

“The purpose of my artwork is to acknowledge the powerful women who came before me, and celebrate them with gratitude, as every present opportunity afforded to me today is because of the sacrifices they made in the past.”

Sophia’s portrait will be exhibited at WA Museum Boola Bardip alongside other Lester Prize Youth Awards finalists from 12 April to 14 July.