VIDEO: Saudi woman bags Guinness award for artwork featuring UAE, Saudi leaders

Gulf Today, Staff Reporter

Ohud Abdullah Almalki, known as ‘The Artist of the Nation,’ marks an incredible milestone becoming the first Saudi woman to achieve a Guinness World Records title singlehandedly, the global authority on record-breaking achievements said.

The Al Naseem neighbourhood product in Jeddah drew the largest coffee painting in the world using expired granules, illustrating seven renowned figures of Saudi Arabia and the neighbouring United Arab Emirates.

Two giant pictures of the founding fathers of the two nations feature in the painting, the late King Abdulaziz Bin Abdul Rahman, and the late Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan. On the painting as well are pictures of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, His Highness Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, and Prince Mohammed Bin Salman Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud.

Bearing in mind the waste, Almalki used approximately 4.5 kg of expired coffee powder only.

She painted all the figures in hues of brown mixing the coffee powder with water. The edges are done with the “Sadu” style that is a traditional Bedouin decoration style. “It took me 45 days of continuous work to complete, under the watchful eyes of two witnesses, video recording and drone footage,” Almalki said.

“My aim is to remind the world of the centuries-old entente between the two nations.”

This painting is called Naseej 1, and it is spread over 220.968 square metres, 15.84 metres long, and 13.95 metres wide. It is made out of 7 connected cotton cloths; each is measuring 15.84 metres long x 2 metres wide.

“Normally, only one kind of coffee is used in such paintings, but I have used 4 different shades of brown coffee. I used several rollers and paint brushes of different sizes to finish this project."

A drone footage of the painting was shown in “Mokhatat Ar-Riyad” neighbourhood in Jeddah with the artist behind the painting with her father. Women of Saudi Arabia took part in previous Guinness World Records attempts, but this is the first time a Saudi woman has achieved a Guinness World Record on her own.

In 2015, the largest human awareness ribbon consisted of 8,264 participants and was achieved by the women of Saudi Arabia at an event organised by 10KSA in Riyadh.

As a student in the 5th year of College of Law at King AbdulAziz University, in Jeddah, Almalki has already taken social media by storm, featuring weekly on popular TV channels across the Mena region.

“This tremendous feat would have been impossible without the support of the people around me. I wish this will contribute to empowering the women in Saudi Arabia and beyond,” she concluded.