Sophia Othman

Sophia was born in Tennessee, and grew up in Baghdad, Iraq, for her first 14 years.  Her family lived in Cardiff, Wales for 2 years and she has lived in California since 1981.  Sophia has been creatively driven since childhood, often modeling miniature clay villages in her back yard using mud from the tigris river.  Her formal education took a crooked path through a Bachelors in Geology and a Masters Program in Nursing Science (she is an RN), a few years of teaching technology.  Her art education includes self-curated in-depth studies in mosaic, welded metal sculpture, concrete sculpture, community built art, and ceramics.  She has been creating mosaic and concrete sculpture since 2003.  She is passionate about large-scale mosaic and sculpture – art the has a palpable impact on the space in which it lives – art that creates a sense of grounded wonder and joy in the observer.   Her guiding artistic vision is to elegantly blend beauty, utility, and meaning.  She is excited by the context-driven transformation of environments via art into places that bring joy and inspiration.  She if often guided in her design by themes found in nature.  She aims for her art to facilitate joy, catalyze profound personal freedom, and evoke a sense of connected belonging.  Her current areas of artistic expansion include community-built art, and handmade ceramic tile, and being a teaching artist. She began by joyfully playing with mud and she is still creating with mud.