About the artist

Born in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, Sonja K’s childhood was already colored by drawing and music, her passions. Grand daughter of Lucas Hendrik Knoll, stained glass artist (Atelier Schouten in Delft) and painter, who devoted his life to the restauration of the stained glass windows of St-John’s church in Gouda, she perpetuates his work through her paintings.

Sonja K. is principally a self taught artist. She briefly studied at the Charles H. Cecil Studios in Florence, Italy and has been inspired by the art of portrait painting at the Atelier Doré with Jean-Claude Lorber, in Cavaillon, France. Being fundamentally interested in human being and their rich expressions, her work and inspiration has evolved through nudes (feminin) and portraits. She regularly paints in Provence, nourished by the intensity of light and energy of the privileged Luberon and Alpilles mountains.

Sonja K. is a permanent artist with the Galleria d'Arte Mentana, a gallery established since more than thirty years in the centre of Florence, Italy. (www.galleriamentana.it)

" In my eyes, Sonja's paintings are like a dream, a reverie inscribed on canvas. They remind me of the Luberon mountains in Provence on a winter morning when the mist rises from the valley floor and transforms the dark outlines of the rocky escarpment into mysterious, soft nebulous forms. Sonja's images incorporate also a great deal of nostalgia, for things that might have happened in the past and might take place yet again in future. They contain all the ingredients of life, the elements of birth, death, and regeneration, an ancient concept that never loses its power of signification. "

K.N. Chaudhuri, writer and art critic

" Sonja K's glance seems to dissolve in the atmosphere of her portraits. Color, light and air are always on the brink of overriding things, on a horizon or on the lines of a body. Relaxed painting that is both attractive and tranquil, in sharp contrast with modern life. "

(K.N. Chaudhuri et Nicola Nuti), art critic