AGAC Primary School Category Finalist - Zenna Suriah - Selfie Re-Imagined

Primary School Finalist in the AGAC 2023

- Artist: Zenna Suriah

- Name: Selfie Re-Imagined

- Size:  580 mm x 410 mm 

- Medium: Acrylic on canvas

- Price: R3,000

Zenna is a Primary School learner at Crawford International and has been awarded as a Finalist in the AGAC Primary School Category. 

About this piece: 

My artwork brings together the timelines of 1660 & 1730, blended into the 21st century. 

In this painting, I used “the entrance to the grand canal Venice” as my background and “the lady and the water jug” as my foreground. The "entrance to the grand canal" was originally painted by Canalletto in 1730. The "lady and the water jug" was originally painted by Johannes Vermeer in 1660-1662. I modernized the paintings by having this 17th-century lady hold a modern-day cellphone, the same way you would take a selfie today.

My personal favorite part of the painting was doing the tiny details in the buildings, on the water, and in the sky. When I was painting the buildings, I was painting some of the statues.  One of the statues didn’t look like a statue, but he reminded me of Casper the friendly ghost.  If you look on the left big dome, you'll see a little white figure; that’s Casper, the friendly ghost. 

If you look carefully on the walkway, you will see a group of little people walking.  On the gondolas you will see some little people rowing the boats and one person kneeling down and fishing for something.  I added little lines in the water to make it look like its flowing.   I also tried to make a reflection in the water of the far away buildings. I added the reflection of the lady on the phone so one can gauge that she's taking a selfie, the very first selfie, if there ever was one in the 17th century.