SOPHIA PEGA

Interview by Noor Zouitina

Photography by Xavier Casanueva

 

Self-taught artist Sophia Pega aims to represent human emotions through her paintings. She creates what feels almost like a healing ritual, encapsulating emotions she has personally experienced throughout her life, which she later translates into her art.

Her process begins with writing down emotions and ideas that arise throughout her day or even in her dreams. These thoughts and ideas take shape in her diary, where they gradually connect and begin to make sense. This is the first stage of the creation process of Pega’s art. While these entries may be a mixture of thoughts and feelings written on paper, they eventually lead to a concrete image in her mind, which she then paints. In this way, viewers are given a glimpse into the depth of Sophia’s world, while also finding a sense of self-representation. Currently based in Paris, Sophia’s artistic journey has been shaped by the places she’s lived, from her childhood in Menorca, Spain, to her time in Barcelona, where she developed her craft, and now her life in the French capital—surrounded by art and melancholy, both of which provide the ideal environment for her artistic creation. This journey culminated in her first solo exhibition. Love, loss, and memory—these are the themes that lie at the heart of Sophia Pega’s latest exhibition and first solo show, The Beginning of the End of Love. In this deeply personal series, Pega explores the emotional shifts we experience during a breakup. The exhibition captures the heavy and heartbroken moment when we first sense love slipping away, with this emotion gradually occupying more space than the love that was once felt. As the exhibition unfolds, Pega takes us through the transformation of grief into something more hopeful—the thrill and possibility of new beginnings that inevitably follow.

Through this series, Pega taps into universal emotions.While the pieces reflect her personal experience withheartbreak, they also speak to the subtle emotionalchanges that occur during these pivotal moments in life.The Beginning of the End of Love is a visual invitationto pause and reflect, encouraging us to think about ourown experiences with love, loss, and personal growth.As Pega shares, her goal is for her art to resonate ona deeply personal level, evoking feelings that viewersmay have once felt themselves.“I was hoping that people who saw the paintings wouldconnect with the ideas behind them, the way you canconnect with a love song because you understandwhere it comes from and feel that someone gave formto your own feelings.” she says.Sophia Pega’s artistic style is introspective and deeplyatmospheric, characterized by a near-monochromaticpalette of dark yet luminous tones—rich umbers, softyellows, muted greys, and subtle hints of blue. Her worksbalance depth and softness, often unfolding graduallyas layers of emotion reveal themselves. The creativeprocess can be both slow and spontaneous, reflectingan ongoing tension between certainty and searching.Inspired by reverie, Pega’s paintings capture a senseof being caught between worlds—real and fleeting,familiar and unknown—inviting viewers into a space ofemotional reflection and transformation.