Saudi woman sets Guinness record, makes 'largest coffee painting'

A Saudi Arabian artist has entered her name in the Guinness Book of World Records by drawing the world's largest coffee painting using expired granules, becoming the first woman from the kingdom to achieve the feat.

Ohud Abdullah Almalki's coffee painting illustrates seven renowned figures of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

She drew two giant pictures of founding fathers, King Abdulaziz bin Abdul Rahman and Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan of Saudi Arabia and the UAE respectively.

Almalki used approximately 4.5 kgs of expired coffee powder. She painted all the figures in hues of brown mixing the coffee powder with water.

"It took me 45 days of continuous work to complete under the watchful eyes of two witnesses, video recording and drone footage. My aim is to remind the world of the centuries-old entente between the two nations," Almalki said.

Called 'Naseej 1', the painting is spread over 220.968 square meters, 15.84 metres long and 13.95 metres wide. It is made out of seven connected cotton cloths; each measuring 15.84 metres long x 2 metres wide.

"Normally, only one kind of coffee is used in such paintings, but I have used four 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," she said.

Women of Saudi Arabia took part in previous Guinness World Records attempts, but this is the first time a Saudi woman has achieved the feat on her own.

In 2015, the largest human awareness ribbon consisted of 8,264 participants and was achieved by the women of Saudi Arabia.

As a student in the Vth year of College of Law at King AbdulAziz University in Jeddah, Almalki features weekly on popular TV channels across the Middle East and North Africa region.