SR Sopha is a wonderfully talented NH artist. While some of his pieces are reminiscent of the surrealist Salvador Dali, others are boldly abstract. His vibrant color choices and organic shapes make a strong and visually stimulating statement.
Read the Q&A below to find out more about SR Sopha!
How long have you been creating art?
I started painting in oils in 1986, at 15 years old. I would consider that the time I began to consider myself serious about art. It wasn’t until 1990 though, that I would say I considered myself an artist, in the sense of inner philosophies. Of course, as a child I was a huge daydreamer and doodler and purportedly, a very good draftsman.
What inspires you the most to create? How do you find inspiration?
It depends on what form I am working in. It all begins with an inner urge, like something needs to be expelled. That just comes when it comes…that’s what I consider to be the actual artistic bent. During the time that that fire is burning, it can be a word, a random thought, a psychic extrapolation, or even just a desire to smell paint and experience the tactility of process.
What is the biggest challenge you face with your art?
The biggest challenge I face with art, right now, is coming to terms with my remaining removed from the iconography of art, probably forever. It’s probably similar to finding out your dying soon, but I’m not, so the feeling will continue until I do die. Other than that, I have a wife and two toddlers, so the ability for me to go in the studio and work for hours on end and come out exhausted are gone for now. These are closely related.
How would you describe your color palette?
Serious.
What is your favorite medium? Least favorite?
I love oils: the smell, the texture, the movement and the amount of focus it gives me when I work at the easel. I also love my water mediums (mixed) because of their expediency, expressiveness and how much concentration it takes to remain unfocused. I also love the good ole pencil. There is nothing more nostalgic than the smell of a pencil! I really have no least favorite medium. Maybe those I have never tried.
How do you work best? Do you have access to a studio?
I have a small studio 12’x13’, in the middle of my house. Everything I own is in that room. People tell me it is like a museum in there. It’s cluttered with my life and all its possessions, and my mixed medium work is very large and I work on the floor with it, so it gets tough to work in there. Plus, I have a lot of stuff I don’t want to get paint on. In the summer I move it outside and I can get an eight foot sheet of paper rolled out and really get lost and sloppy. Of course, then it needs to go back into the studio for protection. So when I am working
big, it is very hard to maneuver around in there. And if I want to get out the guitar, it’s absolute torture. In school I had a good studio space that I was able to get really wet and messy and it was just great to have that sort of freedom.
I need music to draw me out of the day. Headphones work the best, but then I have to deal with the cord yanking on my head when I move around. I don’t like to be disrupted/removed from the groove, especially when I am working in an AE form. It is so time based that if I get removed from the stream there is a noticeable imbalance in the work.
What is your favorite subject matter? Least favorite?
The intangible. Politics.
How do you decide what to focus a piece on?
It’s decided somewhere where I am not concerned. With the AE stuff I am often surprised when I am completed, because I am so removed from the interpretation of my sight.
Would you say that your pieces tell a story/have a narrative? If yes, explain.
Yes, of course, although, probably not individually. Together, all my work is probably the most complete idea of me. I really don’t know how to describe that. My work is very personal, inner, so as a whole, my work is that reflection.
I do think, though, that some of my works can be ascribed a story, individually. They can be taken at their face values too, I mean.
Is there anything else you'd like to add?
I hope I can teach my children to not waste their lives looking for love. I love my wife, but it swallowed an enormous amount of time trying to find her. They should find what they want in life young, and pursue that only. Love themselves above all else, because it’s with themselves that they will die. They are the only solace I have in my failures as an artist. If they fail too, well….then I will be really depressed!
Be sure to check out SR Sopha online by clicking www.srsopha.com, or on any of the images.
Lovely paintings. And politics is my least favorite subject matter too ;)
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