Sophia Shultz

Sophia Kelly Shultz
136 West Bacon Street
Pottsville PA 17901
sophianan@aol.com

Statement: Sophia Kelly Shultz

Shock value is a Thing. There's a whole school of artistic thought whose philosophy is predicated upon the notion that the only way for an artist to get their point across to your viewers is by assaulting them. Shock value is not Sophia Kelly Shultz's Thing. It is not her aim to make people gag or say “EWW!” or get angry over morals, ideals, religion, or political theory. She has no intention of asking the viewer to question heady topics like the nature of modern organized religion or the social impact of gender fluidity.

But her art does have shock value: it makes people blink.

Stand back and look at Pink Lady and you will see a nice Victorian woman wearing a spectacular hat foaming with lace and feathers. If you're paying attention, you'll notice that the hat's focal point is a Tyrannosaurus Rex skull. Now squint. Wait, that's thread? This piece is embroidered? Blink. Similarly, Growth Only Comes After Winter is a pretty picture with vibrant colors and a . Look closer, and this one is not just embroidery: it is executed in I don't know how many glass crystal beads. Blink. Geology Jacket with its matching pillbox hat and shoes...that's all beads! Blink. Ethiopian Wolf and Giant Tube Worms, embroidered in single-strand silk floss on cotton, look like paintings. Blink. And who embroiders giant tube worms, anyway? My History's Embrace is entirely hand-stitched with the exception of the shoulder and side seams? Blink.

Sophia doesn't start a project thinking “This is going to blow their minds!” because she knows that what she thinks will have an impact invariably doesn't: she has determined that it's best if she just does her thing and allows the rest happen on its own.

What every project does begin with, however, is a challenge. Often these challenges are to herself: “Can I make an entire fiber art piece in pink without the finished product looking like I was trying to use up all of my excess pink floss and yarn? Can I find a way to use all of these faceted crystal beads in a fiber art piece rather than in jewelry? Can I create a dressy ensemble that integrates the geologic map of Pennsylvania? How about if I try single-strand silk embroidery for a change? And then there was that double-dog-dare my friends issued after I painted what turned into the inspiration for My History's Embrace, which sent me on a two-and-a-half-year excursion into the world or crazy-quilting!”

Sophia's studio is her palette, and her palette speaks to her in a cacophony of beads and floss and fabric, in cast-off jewelry and yarn.

For Sophia, doing art is not a choice: like breathing, it is an autonomic function. Her fingers itch to hold a pencil or needle or paintbrush and my eyes search constantly for inspiration in the play of light on the color and texture of her assembled materials.

In the long run, the difference between art and breathing is that art is fun. Sophia feels that the fact that her work makes people blink is a happy byproduct of all of this, and particularly very gratifying when she actually gets to see them do it.

Sophia Kelly Shultz is a self-taught artist, from a family of self-taught artists, raised in a home where art was a daily thing, like eating and breathing. For many years she worked as a portraitist, creating a niche for herself in the science fiction community; it is there that she became interested in what at the time was called “costuming” and is now referred to as “cosplay,” only her designs were original and incorporated beads and embroidery, for which she won many awards. Being traditional artists, her family didn't realize that there was something called “fiber arts,' and for years she described this art as “fancy work” and “sewing.” She does keep in touch with her artistic roots: her publications with Schiffer Publishing feature work in watercolor and gouache, colored pencil or pen and ink.

Recent Publications and Exhibitions
2021: "Wild Things" at the Cultural Center at Rocky Neck. "Seth, God of the Pandemic--I Mean, Chaos" and "Ethiopian Wolf" are among 45 pieces chosen from a field of 190 applicants for exhibition.
2021: Reclaiming the Earth: A Preliminary Report on Research, Documentation, and Deconstruction of Tectonic Patriarchy and Gender Bias. The Showbear Family Circus online publication, crushing scientific satire. http://lanceschaubert.org/2021/01/01/reclaiming-the-earth/
Envision Arts Online Gallery Threaded Exhibition: Moss, Olympus
https://www.envisionartshow.com/threaded-iii
2020: Seeking the Spirits of Palo Kimbisa (with Tata Rodriguez). Schiffer Publishing. 50 pen and ink drawings; responsible for text based upon Tata Rodriguez' stories)
2019: Sacred Threads Exhibition selected My History's Embrace for exhibit.
2016: The Promethean Oracle (with Mark Cogan). Schiffer Publishing. 50 cards, originals in colored pencil on black paper; responsible for text based upon Mark Cogan's concepts.
2015, 2014, 2011: Paintings included in We'Moon on the Wall, a nationally-distributed calendar.
2013: The Stone Circle Oracle. Schiffer Publishing. 50 cards, originals in watercolor; responsible for text.
2011: Guest exhibitor, Tucson Gem Show. The Morefield Gem Mine, six watercolors featuring a mine in central Virginia.
2009: Rocks and Minerals Magazine. Featured in March/April issue.

Recent Awards
2021
Light Space and Time Online Gallery “Landscapes”
https://www.lightspacetime.art/landscapes-art-exhibition-2021-overall-category/
Overall: Hemlock Hole 1, 4th place (of over 500 entries)
Woodlawn Annual Needlework Show and Sale
Beadwork: Geology Ensemble, 3rd place
Surface Embroidery: Moss, 2nd place
Ecru, 3rd place
Pink Lady, 2nd place
Arts Center East Wearable Art Exhibit
My History's Embrace, 3rd place
Abington Arts Center
Pink Lady, 3rd place; the judge redefined “mosaic” to include “beads”.
J. Mane Gallery “All Women” online exhibit
https://www.jmanegallery.com/all-women-2021
Growth Only Comes After Winter, 3rd place
2020
Woodlawn Annual Needlework Show and Sale
Surface Embroidery: Ethiopian Wolf, 1st place
Giant Tube Worms, 3rd place
My History's Embrace, Honorable Mention
2019
Dimensional Expressions at Artful Dimensions Gallery
My History's Embrace: 1st place

POTTSVILLE

Pennsylvania

United States