Budding artist Anika Firouzman is hoping to make a name for herself in the US.
The 22-year-old has been invited to exhibit her work at the Agora Art Gallery in New York after she entered an online competition. The gallery will be featuring her pictures, which are based around her cultural Jewish heritage, for three weeks.
Miss Firouzman, who lives in Dagenham, Essex, tells People: "This will be the biggest thing I have done so far." She says: "I have been doing art since I was a kid but it was before my GCSEs, when I started doing portraits, that I realised I had a passion for it."
Her pieces include Israeli soldiers in despair and a painting of the rabbi and his wife that were killed in Mumbai. She has also done a picture for Chabad Rabbi Aryeh Sufrin.
She hopes to become a qualified art therapist and is working at the Art Factory in Essex.
