Sunayna Adhlaka’s abstract geometrical painting depicts a mother and child. The eight-year-old talks to Riya Sharma during her first solo exhibition
We would generally associate an eight-year-old with activities like braiding her Barbie doll, playing with jigsaw puzzles and hot wheels cars, and on rare occasions, doodling. But it is unlikely that you would find an eight-year-old girl painting, almost professionally, leave alone exhibiting them at a gallery.
At Sunayna Adhlaka’s first solo exhibition titled I look, I perceive, I paint, we find a painting of a pug. “That is Mishri,” Sunayna told us. “Mishri is four-years-old and I treat her like my sister. I paint her often and those are my favourites,” she adds.
We found out that the little artist’s first tryst with the canvas when she was three. She recalled, “My mother handed me a brush and exposed me to the world of colours. I painted a portrait of a mother and child depicting my relationship with my mother.”
Her mother, Kim, added, “She started off with simple geometric shapes. And I thought they meant nothing until she explained it to me, ‘look mumma, this is you and me.’”
The exhibits at Alliance Francaise displayed a range of paintings from a peacock, a lake side scenery and paintings of Mishri. Sunayna uses water colours and acrylic in all her paintings and for her it is an ‘expression of her creativity.’ It takes her almost 20 days to complete a single painting.