Yvette Coppersmith Ella Simons seated

Climate activist and high school student Ella Simons was 13 years old when she became an organiser for the School Strike for Climate movement in 2019. She was 14 when she met Archibald-winning artist Yvette Coppersmith, who immediately sensed her vibrant energy.

‘On her 15th birthday, she was on a plane to Milan as the Australian delegate at the Youth4Climate summit, ahead of COP26 [UN Climate Change Conference] in Glasgow, where she was the youngest of 400 international delegates. Greta Thunberg was among them,’ says Coppersmith.

‘I had a couple of sittings with Ella after her return. We looked for props and outfits in her bedroom. I chose to create a calm, quiet tone for the painting, to amplify the seriousness of Ella and her message.

‘This painting is a form of protest. It transmits Ella’s presence and wakes us up to this moment in human evolution and the window of opportunity to abate the trajectory of climate change.’