Arantza Peña Popo Biography

Arantza Peña Popo is a Georgia-based high school senior who won the US 2019 Doodle for Google national competition. She is a visual artist who often captures the immigration experience. Google honored her by running her Google Doodle on August 13, 2019.

She is a visual artist who began drawing when she was three years old. She revealed that her attraction to draw comes from being able to create something that “didn’t exist minutes before.” In a world with “so many rules and restrictions,” she noted that being an artist gives a person freedom and in the future, she hopes to publish alternative graphic novels and comics.

Arantza Peña Popo Age

Popo is 18 years old.

Arantza Peña Popo Education

Arantza graduated from Arabia Mountain High School, in DeKalb, Georgia, where she was valedictorian and plans to attend the University of Southern California.

Arantza Peña Popo Mother

Popo’s mother’s name is not in the public domain but she was the inspiration being the doodle. The description on the Google Doodle says that Arantza’s mom described her as a person who “lights up any room she is in.”

Arantza Peña Popo Immigrant

According to AJC.com Popo was born in Colombia and migrated to the United States as a young child. Her artwork often captures the immigrant experience.

She said; “I feel we have to be the vessel for other voices that can’t be heard.”

She previously submitted artwork to a contest sponsored by the Latin American Association that was designed to focus on the immigrant experience.

She told Vox ATL about that artwork; “I try to display this minimalistic kind of artwork with these two houses and it kind of demonstrates how in both places where immigrants try to find some kind of refuge they seem to be rejected.

For example a lot of immigrants and refugees, their places of origin, they have war, or maybe there’s a lot of criminals or gangs and through that destruction, you know, they are being rejected and pushed out of their homes. And when they try to find some kind of refuge here in the United States they also feel that kind of destruction and that violence put towards them in a place where they are trying to, you know, find peace.”

Arantza Peña Popo Google Doodle

On August 12, 2019 Arantza Peña Popo was revealed by Jimmy Fallon on his show as the winner of the US 2019 Doodle for Google. This is the 11th year of the Doodle for Google competition, each with a different theme. This year’s theme was “When I grow up, I hope…”

Google honored her by displaying her doodle on the homepage with being one of the company’s favorite moments of the year. According to Google, her doodle shows her mother carrying Arantza as a baby in a framed picture. Underneath that, you see an older Arantza, taking care of her mother as she grows older, in the circle of life.

Google added that the framed picture mirrors one of her mother carrying her sister that Arantza saw in the family’s home.

During an interview with Google when asked how she came up with the idea for the Doodle she said; “I came up with the idea at the last minute, actually the day of the deadline. I looked at the photograph of my mother (the real version that inspired the drawing) and thought, “Hey, why don’t I reverse it?” I wanted to focus more on a message of helping out my awesome mother, more than anything else.”

When explaining the piece theme she said; “When I grow up, I hope to care for my mom as much as she cared for me my entire life. In my doodle, there is a framed picture of my mother carrying me as a baby─a real picture in my house─and below the picture is me, caring for her when she’s older in the future.”

Doodle For Google Prizes 2019-  Doodle For Google Prizes

According to The Champion Newspaper as a winner Popo will receive a $30,000 college scholarship and her school will receive a $50,000 technology package or improvement of its computer lab or technology program. In addition to her doodle being featured on Google’s homepage for a day.

Arantza Pena Popo Congressional Arts Competition

On April 21, 2018, while she was a junior at Arabia Mountain High School she was the grand prize winner at Rep. Johnson’s 2018 Congressional Arts Competition at the Lou Walker Senior Center in Lithonia. She earned a four-year scholarship worth $12,000 a year to attend the Savannah College of Art & Design (SCAD) for her “Cultural Portrait” piece. Arantza described her work as a “cultural portrait of facial adornment from different cultures.” She used charcoal to create the piece. Her work was displayed at the U.S. Capitol.

During the 2019 Georgia United Scholarship, she said she wanted to establish a non-profit to create packaging design for minority businesses for free. “I intend to teach younger students art skills through free after-school programs and enrichment camps.” She also added that she wants to paint murals to help beautify disadvantaged neighborhoods and communities.