FEVER DREAMS
Sofia Arnold
Nov 18 – Dec 29, 2018
Drawing from experiences and memories from having grown up as a daughter of 1970s “back to the landers” in unglaciated Southern Wisconsin, Sofia Arnold’s watercolors reflect a whimsical mishmash of intoxicated figures and foliage. Her figures dance and interact with creatures and vegetation in the murky wooded countryside. They hauntingly emerge from behind trees and interact awkwardly with others. Working quickly, she uses a technique of wet-on-wet watercolors to create muted colors and lush dreamlike imagery. Her work plays on primal tensions of freedom in opposition to the suffocating nature of being trapped.

“I am trying to capture with paint what I see as the primal qualities of a place: the shifting sensory touchstones that confuse me about feeling at home, but also hemmed in and trapped.”
– Sofia Arnold
Biography CV Statement
Utilizing mediums of oil and watercolor, Sofia Arnold creates scenes that encompass a mishmash of intoxicated figures that dance and interact with creatures amongst lush foliage. Much of the series developed from her former life that existed on the fringe of society oscillating between feral and civilized, savage, and feminine.

“Over time my working style has loosened and expanded while my focus has shifted to my own everyday surroundings and subconscious. I pull from a rotating mental inventory of objects and characters that are clumsily recycled and often corrupted incrementally from piece to piece.“
— Sofia Arnold
