Sophie’s earliest memories are of pinching vegetables from under the Portobello road stalls at the age of 3, the pungent smell of linseed oil and turps and her mother saying firmly ‘Don’t disturb me, I’m painting!’.

Born into an extremely artistic background, she considered theatre but then chose to follow in her mother’s footsteps. She attended Wimbledon College of Art and then Camberwell College of Art and design in the early 1980’s. She left with a good degree and won second prize for drawing.

At this time drawing as a discipline was taught as a core subject and Sophie’s desire to bring a sense of structure and design to her pictures still underpins and influences her freer work of today. Significant role models have included such artists as Rembrandt, Rouault, Paul Klee and Turner.

An interest in landscapes and seascapes instigated her move from London to the South coast in 1983. Over the last two decades she has used a variety of painting and printmaking media and she enjoys experimenting with different textures and surfaces.

During the 1990’s she exhibited at the Royal Academy several times and had two successful solo exhibitions at the Piers Feetham Gallery, Fulham, London. A member of the Rye Society of Artists she regularly shows in the local area and usually features in the annual Coastal Currents Festival Open studios. Over the years she has also undertaken commissions These include illustrating a series of books on the Scottish Islands and having ten images published in ‘The art of Landscape and Seascape painting’ Gerald Woods 1989.

Sophie is also a Careers advisor and Arts Coordinator. Since 2005 she has played a dynamic role by actively promoting visual arts activity in the South East region. She advertises exhibitions, events and job opportunities through a website and newsletter, ‘Artwatchnews’ www.artwatchnews.co.uk. In 2007 she also produced a publication to promote galleries and museums in the area:
Artwatchguide to Museums and Galleries in Hastings and Rother.

Her late mother Joanna Carrington was a well known painter, niece of Dora Carrington, the painter affiliated to the renowned Bloomsbury group through her partnership with Lytton Strachey. In 2005 Joanna’s husband, Christopher Mason wrote a lavishly illustrated book on her life.