Sophie Manessiez

Sophie Manenessiez is a ceramic artist from France. She has lived and worked in Quebec for 14 years. She has traveled a diverse career path. After studying visual arts and communications, she pursued a professional career in events. She discovered her passion for ceramics more than 20 years ago.

It was in 2007 that she decided to devote herself fully to ceramics. Sophie follows several training courses in various workshops in France and Quebec. She obtained her diploma in ceramic craft techniques in 2021 in Montreal. Participant in various group exhibitions in Quebec, Ontario and the United States, member of the Quebec crafts council and the Corporation of Quebec crafts in Estrie, Sophie has received various awards and recognition for her creations ceramics.

After several years of practice, training and study, the ceramist is now developing her own body of contemporary works. His ceramic work demonstrates his attraction to an aesthetic of organic form, line, and repetition, where the meeting of material and form embodies the subtle delicacy that gives each piece its uniqueness. Sophie’s workshop is located on Mount Shefford, in Estrie, nestled in the woods and bathed in light. Creation is conducive to this.

Artistic approach

Sensitive to touch, to the multiple facets of textures, to the play of light on the reliefs of materials, I work with the earth and explore the multiple aesthetic possibilities that this medium offers. My artistic approach is a dialogue between my observations and interpretations of the collective multiplying the potential of uniqueness and material. I am interested in how different perceptions of a subject are expressed.

My sculptures play on the multiplication of lines or simple shapes, resulting in complex, delicate and organic structures. It is in unity, repetition, the movement of visible or invisible links that my research evolves.

My creative process is an integral part of the final work: I interact with the material, I explore its character, I tame its brutality and with my hand I push it to its limits, to extract its delicacy. I repeat this gesture, its meticulousness, its precision, its efficiency until I obtain a rhythm where time no longer counts. I mix a natural instinctive and impulsive impulse, strongly contrasted by the precise attention of the repetitive and controlled gesture. It is the duality of this dialogue which places the work in timelessness.

From the clay, I create a new material, in movement, fluid, rich in nuances. It is in the contrast of porcelain and stoneware, their textures, that my artistic language develops. I create a soothing poetic balance, revealing the subtle fragile emotions of the material, in a unique visual dimension.