Suraya’s career began as a textile designer when she completed her three year course in 1979 at M.L. Sultan College of Education.

Throughout the course of her textile career, she attended various workshops on drawing, painting, weaving and ceramics, but it was not until 2008 when a painting by Grace Kotze inspired and prompted her into taking the first steps towards painting seriously, with the intention of exhibiting and eventually painting on a full-time basis. And, so began a long association and friendship attending weekly painting classes with Grace.

Suraya works primarily in oils and is also inspired by tribal art and craft, textile craft and clay.  She basically enjoy making things.

Her current work addresses issues which we face on a daily basis.  Displacement and migration, the erosion of our basic human rights where our children are denied the liberty of inheriting a world devoid of danger and war, navigating a world where our choices on sexuality and how we choose to live is often considered a crime.

But, it also speaks of introspection and cocooning. Hope and spaces which allow for a rebirth of communion and community as a way of holding ourselves and one another in safety and love.