Two artists are celebrating after being invited to take part in their first commercial gallery exhibition.

Seventeen-year-olds Mariam Rafique and Sobia Siddiq are both year 12 students at Withington Girls' School in Manchester.

The friends, who are studying Fine Art at A Level, have each submitted a portrait for the exhibition, which runs for one week from 29 June.

The group show is organised by the Gateway Gallery in order to give a platform to up and coming Greater Manchester artists.

Mariam's work depicts her mother Zahida in traditional dress. She said: "My starting point was thinking about my identity, my past and my heritage.

"I took an off-guard picture of my mum in her everyday clothes and worked on my painting from that as I wanted it to be a very natural representation of her. She will see my portrait for the first time when she comes to the exhibition.

Glasgow-born Mariam, now living in Bramhall, Stockport, names one of her main influences as African-American portrait artist Kehinde Wiley, who is famous for his official portrait of Barack Obama.

Sobia's work, a series of three lino-printed portraits, explores mental health issues and the marginalisation of people of colour. The Whalley Range student plans to study either film making or Psychology at university.

Susan Eyres, co-director of Gateway Gallery said: "Galleries, like Premiership football clubs, usually want to find a fully formed artist with a ready market, letting others do the hard yards and being unwilling to take risks.

"This schools' exhibition is our small attempt to help bridge this gap, to celebrate the work being produced by budding artists across the region and to give them the opportunity to see their work in a gallery environment."

The Schools Exhibition takes place at Gateway Gallery, 116 Ashley Road, Hale WA14 2UN from Friday 29 June until Saturday 7 July. The gallery is open Tuesday-Saturday.