Sophia Bakos – Artist Biography
Sophia Bakos is a Vancouver based multidisciplinary artist who completed her bachelor’s degree with Distinction in Studio Arts at Concordia University in 2022. For the past year, Bakos has worked solely in contribution to her textile/photographic series entitled Skin of Her Teeth. The series speaks to Bakos’ experiences with sexual harm through combination of analog portraiture and various textile mediums such as needle felting and hand-sewing. Bakos’ textile work is extension of herself, in that she incorporates her likeness or an element of her person in each piece. Feminine colours and textures are utilized to represent the sweetness of girlhood, though this sweetness is steeped in sullied memories of late adolescence.
Bakos’ AMATEUR saw its first public debut in 2021 at Gallery George in Vancouver, B.C for the annual Parker Art Salon, and has since been displayed at the East Side Culture Crawl for three consecutive years. Individual pieces from the series have also been exhibited, the most recent being with The ShockBoxx Gallery’s 2023 exhibition of Not An Art Fair in Hermosa Beach California, and with Hera’s Gallery’s virtual show, Girl Art Now in 2024. The AMATEUR series saw its first solo exhibition in September 2023 at Vancouver’s James Black Gallery. In early 2024, Bakos will participate in the multi-city erotic art exhibition entitled A Hot Minute, which takes place in three Galleries across Canada: Gallery Merrick in Victoria B.C, Ashdale Gallery in North Vancouver, B.C, and Christine Klassen Gallery in Calgary, Alberta. Bakos currently resides in Brooklyn, New York as she participates in an artist residency with Residency Unlimited.
索菲亚·巴科斯
索菲亚·巴科斯 (Sophia Bakos) 是一位来自温哥华的多学科艺术家，于 2022 年以优异的成绩在康科迪亚大学获得了艺术学士学位。在过去的一年里，巴科斯仅致力于她题为“Skin of Her Teeth”的纺织品/摄影系列的创作。该系列通过模拟肖像画和针毡和手工缝纫等各种纺织媒介的结合，讲述了巴科斯遭受性伤害的经历。巴科斯的纺织作品是她自己的延伸，因为她在每件作品中都融入了她的肖像或她本人的元素。女性化的色彩和纹理被用来代表少女时代的甜蜜，尽管这种甜蜜沉浸在青春期后期的肮脏记忆中。
巴科斯的《业余》(AMATEUR) 于 2021 年在温哥华的帕克艺术沙龙上首次公开亮相，此后连续三年在温哥华东区文化节中展出。 该系列的单件作品也已展出，最近的一次是在 ShockBoxx 画廊 2023 年在加利福尼亚州赫莫萨海滩举办的 Not An Art Fair 展览中，以及赫拉画廊 2024 年的虚拟展览《Girl Art Now》中。2023年9月，AMATEUR 在温哥华詹姆斯·布莱克画廊 (James Black Gallery) 迎来了首次个展。 2024 年初，巴科斯将参加题为“A Hot Minute”的多城市艺术展，该展览在加拿大各地的三个画廊举行：加拿大维克多利亚市的 Merrick 画廊、北温哥华的 Ashdale 画廊和卡尔加里的 Christine Klassen 画廊。 巴科斯目前正在纽约布鲁克林参与 Residency Unlimited 的艺术家驻留项目。
Sophia Bakos – Artist Statement
Through AMATEUR, I confront the emotional impact of sexual assaults I suffered as a teenager – assaults which were perpetrated largely by adult men. The series utilizes up-cycled fabric, magazine clippings, photographic portraiture, and poetry in the construction of needle-felted collages and hand-sewn rag dolls – each piece marred by a visual or written suggestion of sex and violence. The series utilizes highly recognizable symbols of girlhood such as Hello Kitty, baby dolls, Calico Critters figurines and teddy bears. These emblems of adolescence are starkly juxtaposed by embroidered sexual profanity and references to Pornhub and bondage. Dissonance between youth and sex present in each work, marks the horrible absurdity of posturing young girls as objects of forbidden lust.
AMATEUR is motivated by tender conversations between myself and important women in my life, specifically with my closest friends Vittoria, Carolina, Jaylyn, and Tatum. These women are recurring characters throughout the series and have served as my greatest muses for the project, as it is our discussions of assault and sexual harm that have emboldened me to bare my wounds through AMATEUR.
The ultimate objective of AMATEUR is to loudly condemn the sexualization of teenage girls in contemporary media and in everyday life, and as well create a space where women may find inspiration in each other’s resilience.
索菲亚·巴克斯 – 作品陈述
通过《业余》系列，我面对了青少年时期所遭受的性侵犯所带来的情绪影响。这些性侵犯主要来自成年男性。这个系列的作品采用了升级再造的面料、杂志剪报、肖像摄影和诗歌，构建了针毡拼贴画以及手工缝制的布娃娃————每件作品都带有视觉或书面的性和暴力暗示。该系列采用了极具辨识度的少女时代象征，如Hello Kitty、婴儿娃娃、Calico Critters雕像和泰迪熊。这些青春期的象征与华丽的性亵渎以及对 Pornhub 和束缚的提及形成鲜明对比。每部作品中都存在青春与性之间的不和谐，标志着将年轻女孩视为禁忌欲望对象的荒谬。
《业余》系列的动力来自于我与生命中重要女性之间的对话，特别是与我最亲密的朋友维多利亚、卡罗莱纳、杰林和塔图姆。这些女性朋友们是整个系列中反复出现的角色，也是我在这个项目中最伟大的缪斯，因为正是我们对攻击和性伤害的讨论让我有勇气通过《业余》系列作品来揭露我的伤口。
《业余》系列的最终目标是大声谴责当代媒体和日常生活中对少女的性化，并创造一个空间，让女性可以从彼此的坚韧中找到灵感。
Sophia Bakos – CV
Education
2017 Completed Foundation Year at Emily Carr University of Art and Design on scholarship, Vancouver, B.C.
2018-2023 Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec. Obtained Bachelors Degree in Studio Arts with Distinction
Exhibitions
2018 James Black Gallery, Quickie, Vancouver, B.C.
2020 Womenswork.art Gallery, Twilight Year – National Juried Exhibition, Poughkeepsie, New York.
2021 Gallery Merrick – Victoria, BC.
2021 Pendulum Gallery, Essential Travel- An Artful Voyage – Parker Art Salon, Vancouver, BC.
2021-2023 1000 Parker Street Studios, Eastside Culture Crawl -Vancouver, BC.
2023 Gallery Syre, All you Need is Love – group exhibition, Bellingham, Washington.
2023 Shockboxx Gallery, Not an Art Fair – group exhibition, Hermosa Beach, California.
2023 James Black Gallery, AMATEUR – solo exhibition, Vancouver, B.C.
2024 Hera Gallery, Girl Art Now – virtual group exhibition, Wakefield, Rhode Island.
2024 Gallery Merrick and Ashdale Gallery, A Hot Minute – juried group exhibition, Nanaimo, B.C and North Vancouver, B.C.
Experience
2018 Renegade Arts Company, The Drift Festival, co-curation, advertisement design, administration and studio rental.
2020 Public Art Creator, Murals of Empathy, Local government initiative.
2023 Gallery Gachet, installation technician and gallery minding.
2024 Residency Unlimited – Artist Residency, February 2024 – May 2024, Brooklyn, New York.
Awards
2017 Emily Carr University of Art and Design – early admittance, scholarship and application omission based on portfolio.
2023 Concordia University – Bachelors with Distinction for excellent grade point average.