One talented student has paid tribute to her late father in the way she knows best, her artwork leading her to winning a prize during Catholic Education Week.
Altona’s Mount St. Joseph Girls’ College Sunita Daravong won the Secondary Schools Portrait Prize for her four highly detailed coloured pencil drawings.
“The drawings are of my dad in little books. I wanted to represent stories in a book,” she said.
“The drawings are really about my emotions and my dad’s life.”
Ms Daravong used her close relationship with her dad as a way to harness her creativity and create the final pieces.
“He was very significant in my life. He was my main carer which helped me when I was picking what I wanted to do,” she said.
“I found it really easy with drawing and subject matter, to plan and get ideas when I would look at my dad’s pictures and think about our relationship together.”
It has been five years since her father passed away and her art pays tribute to his memory.
The pieces were selected by Ms Daravong’s teacher in her Year 12 Art Making and Exhibiting class, taking her by surprise.
“My teacher told me she was going to keep the artwork to submit in an exhibition, I thought I’ll just see if I get it,” she said.
“When it got in I was happy and it took me a while to get back into it because it had been so long since I made them.”
The pieces were on display at the Catholic Education Week Creative Arts Exhibition and rewarded with a trophy and a cash prize.
Jennifer Pittorino
