Title: Gaga
Artist: Sarnia de la Maré FRSA, 2025
Medium: Digital caricature illustration
A bold, satirical homage to the pop iconography of modern fame. “Gaga” exaggerates glamour, distortion, and self-invention — a study in performance as persona. The golden palette and fluid lines reference the artificial perfection of celebrity culture, while the caricature form embraces imperfection and wit.
⚖️ Disclaimer
This artwork is an original satirical caricature created for artistic commentary and educational purposes. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or representative of the real individual depicted. All likenesses are exaggerated and interpretive, intended as social or cultural critique. No commercial use or resale is implied.
✨ Introduction to Fame Studies, Volume I — Pop, Power & Parody
By Sarnia de la Maré FRSA
The new book will be published early December on Kindle
Fame, it seems, is the last great religion.
Its icons beam down from digital heavens, re-engineered and retouched, worshipped and destroyed with equal fervour. In this book, I have chosen to draw the saints and sinners of that strange pantheon — not as they appear on screen, but as they might exist in the theatre of exaggeration.
Each portrait began as a single line — a kind of confession, both theirs and mine. The exaggerations are intentional: lips become declarations, cheekbones architectural, eyes fixed with the frozen light of celebrity. These are not likenesses; they are commentaries.
Caricature has always been the subversive cousin of portraiture — it tells the truth by lying outrageously. Within the distortions there is empathy, too, because exaggeration is only possible through fascination. I draw the famous not to flatter them but to question the machinery that creates them, the endless recycling of image and persona that defines modern myth-making.
Fame Studies is therefore not a gallery of faces, but a mirror held to the cultural machine. It is a study of power, performance, and play — where satire and admiration dance an awkward waltz.
As you turn the pages, you may recognise the world’s best-known visages. You may also recognise yourself — in the need to be seen, the impulse to curate, the urge to shimmer in the digital light.
Each caricature is paired with a short commentary: sometimes analytical, sometimes playful, always personal. Together, they form a diary of observation — one line, one curve, one glimmer at a time.