Zoe Jenkins

My inspiration for this piece of artwork was Raden Saleh’s Forest Fire. Raden Saleh created the painting as a gift towards King William the III in 1849. The painting was originally geographically associated with Indonesia.

However, it reminded me of when I was a toddler. I felt a link to when I lived in Vietnam and there was a statue of a tiger; I would place a flower in its mouth whenever I walked by. Furthermore, the number nine featured in my painting is based off Vietnam’s lucky number. I also used a warm colour palette to recreate the fire seen in Forest fire. The flowers lead in a fiery flame from the entrance of the tigers mouth to link to the statue, as well as the forest Fire seen in Raden Saleh’s painting.

After two or three prototypes, I settled on a version of the artwork and began to paint. As I painted, I thought of texture, contrast between colours, and how to create a bold effect while borrowing swatches of colour from the original painting for the flowers.