First Threshold Painting

Sofiya was born in Moscow in 1998 and is currently based in New York City. Sofiya has developed a personal vision based on intimate moments of her life as a means to draw commentary about complex yet commonly relatable ideas. The focuses of some of her recent series are exploring the duality of lives of New York City nightlife performers in the time of pandemic isolation or discussing the sense of belonging in the context of immigration. A lot of her art draws inspiration from my experience of immigrating to New York from Russia and discovering a new more open-minded culture she was not exposed to before. The vibrant artistic community she was immersed into in the US often becomes the subject of her mainly figurative paintings. In her work, Sofiya wants to create a connection between Russian humanistic tradition of painting and contemporary themes of urban living in a Western megapolis. Growing up in such vastly different backgrounds inspires her to express all of the influences she encountered on her path and show the vulnerability that unites the people in both worlds. Sofiya prefers oil paint as her main material due to its ability to convey light and intricate color relations through the layering of transparencies. She often uses dramatic lighting in her work to navigate the viewer’s attention through the paintings and create a story by establishing a hierarchy between depicted objects. Her work is mostly representational, and she tends to include many details into compositions to add layers of narrative to her work and allow each element to tell its own story. AWARDS Special Presidential Grant - School of Visual Arts CIA 2D3D Competition Honorable Mention Doctor Aromas Foundation Competition Honorable Mention Florida State Fair Senior Portfolio Competition 2nd Place 2016 YoungArts Winner Honorable Mention in Visual Arts AP Art Showcase 1st Place Award For "Pollock Cake" "Venice in Art" International Casanova- Arts Lover Award 2015 Scholastic Art & Writing Awards Gold Key, Silver Key, and Honorable Mention