A Musician’s Winter Dream: First Stage Silver Medal

Art is a subject that evokes creativity, confidence, and passion within students. At SLAS, we encourage and cultivate the shared Core Values and work to integrate it within the various disciplines found in Art with our Wildcats, ensuring everyone has the tools and opportunity to show their unique ‘voices’ through their work.  

One of our unique student voices has had a resounding reception having placed in 4 competitions this summer including a competition run by the European Association of Culture and Education. G12 Annyka Ma’s piece “A Musician’s Winter Dream” will be showcased in Paris at the world renowned Louvre in October!

The competition is based around surreal art and focuses on artists such as Pablo Picasso. Each student is encouraged to show their distinctive style and creative flair, and Annyka certainly did that. Here are some of her thoughts:

Inspirations: My inspirations for this painting mainly came from Salvador Dali, a famous surrealist artist. I was captivated by the randomness and ‘nonsense’ that was presented by his paintings and the surrealist art genre in general, which spurred me to create my own surrealist painting. I was mostly inspired by Dali’s painting “The Temptation of Saint Anthony” and Kush’s “African Sonata”. These works motivated me to paint the animals as a main component in my project. Moreover, I was also inspired from Savanna watering holes, which is where animals gather around a pool of water in savannas. For the texture of the water in my painting, I took inspiration from Van Gogh’s “The Starry Night’, hence the colorful streaks of paint. I replaced parts of the elephants with instruments because I just had a random thought that tubas sounded vaguely like the call of an elephant. 

Process: I mainly used blue, colder colors for the background to push the mountains backwards, while highlighting the yellow, brighter savanna in the foreground. This way, you can still see the snowy mountains clearly yet they do not become too prominent to clash with the animals and savanna.

Afterthoughts: “I believe art is an indefinite, formless entity that is brought into shape by the randomness and miscellaneous experiences pieced together within the mind of the artist. There has never been a necessity for a specific purpose to make art, for art at it’s purest form is an expression of the state of mind.”

Inspiration: I was heavily inspired by our school’s community service trip last year to Hainan. We went to a sea animal rescue and rehabilitation facility, where we saw real turtles who were rescued due to their injuries. After learning about the slim chances of survival these creatures had and the impossible barriers in their lives, I was moved by the persistence of this species. Even under heavy pollution and human interference, they were still surviving. I created this painting to not only bring awareness to the looming problem of sea turtle endangerment, but also to show the distress and the raw emotion behind this. I made the turtle more prominent to almost show its pain and sorrow from being tormented by trash and plastic pollution.

Nature is undoubtedly a corner stone of human society. It is the interconnecting piece that holds together the world as we know it, from the smallest sprout to the largest blue whale to the everyday person. This connection of humanity to nature has existed ever since the dawn of man, and to this day, despite our busy routines in bustling cities, that connection can be rebuilt through a simple interaction. During my school fieldtrip in Hainan earlier this year, we were showed the medical care and rescue centers for endangered sea turtles. It was an eye-opening experience, as not only were we educated about their search and rescue projects, but also their dire situation. It shocked me that only 1 in 1,000 hatchlings make it to adulthood, and even this one-in-a-thousand hatchling might not survive due to increasing human activities. This prompted me to make this piece; it’s not only a warning message, but a call for help from the sea turtles. Over the years, human carbon emissions have increased Earth’s heat absorption capabilities. With rising temperature, less male sea turtles are hatching, causing breeding difficulties. Other factors like plastic and waste pollution also threaten developing or adult turtles. As an individual, I know there’s at least something I coud do – to spread awareness with my art. By educating more people about this alarming crisis, we can ensure that in the future, our descendants will still have an ocean ecosystem to admire, just like the past generations.

Inspiration: I was inspired by the prominent and looming issue of pollution and global warming. This piece presents how I want the Earth to be saved from the dire consequences certain to take place if we do not change our current ways. The hands represent humanity if it is willing to change and lift the Earth from the pollution and complacency below.

Thoughts: This piece is very special to me because it was one of the first paintings I created for my college portfolio. It was also my grandfather’s favorite art piece, and he even set it as his profile picture. After he passed away in 2022, I was devastated, and remember looking back to see his unchanged profile picture on wechat of this art piece. It’s my main motivation for continuing to do art and strive for the best. I named the piece “The Plains Will Live On” because my grandfather used to work on the plains of QingHai, and this is a piece named in memory of him. At the same time, it also symbolizes how the Earth and its plains will continue to live on as humanity strives to stop and even reverse the effects of pollution.

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SLAS will continue to strive to support in the nurturing and fostering of young talents such as Annyka for future national and international success! Follow for more updates!