Art Description (What inspired you to create the artwork?) “Lost Faces of the Land of Gold”

The inspiration for this piece stems from an ode to my ancestors that were torn apart from their roots during colonial times - my motherland of Ghana. I approached this painting with themes of pain, grief and displacement along with honour. The use of special chosen acrylic and oil paint colours helped represent various aspects of these themes. The blue background is the foundation of the painting that represents the waters that hold many of these lost souls to this day. Those who chose to drown and return to mother earth rather than be enslaved. For some, the blue hues of the sea were the final images engrained after being violently uprooted from the land, cultures and world they once knew to be home. The red represents the blood of those who lost their lives fighting for liberation from colonizers. These two colours helped me bring to life my themes of pain,grief and displacement. To juxtapose those ideas, I wanted to bring forth colours that would highlight and represent pride and honour. For centuries, the beautiful black and brown tones of my people have always been demonized and weaponized against us, so by incorporating jet black acrylic and oil paints, I wanted to exaggerate the importance of representing black skin and loving this skin in a world that is fixated on dehumanizing us. The use of yellow along with the gold Bamboo Earring used as a septum, embodies the gold that lies beneath the land of Ghana. This mineral is very precious to the people of my motherland because gold is representative of royalty, and it acts as a symbol of warmth and continuous life. So though the faces of these souls may be lost, their legacy will forever live. These colours come together to create the mosaic of faces within faces that depict the lost, but never forgotten souls of the Land of Gold. The motherland. An ode to home and the souls of the land. Ghana.