ABOUT SOPHIE WELCH

HELLO AND WELCOME TO MY SANCTUARY STUDIO

My name is Sophie Welch. I’m an artist, mother, full time job juggler and passionate nature and wildlife lover.

My art is created with the intention to embody feelings of empathy, connection, hope, positivity, strength, feminine energy and emotional wellbeing. It is an invitation to go within and feel, to take up space and reclaim your power. To see the natural world through a different lens and awaken the senses, to smell the flowers, hear the birds singing and evoke warm childhood memories of empathy, joy and self assurance. It asks you to reconnect with nature and wildlife, which is something we need now more than ever.

Life has become busy and loud. Time spent in nature is very grounding and calming and it resets our nervous systems. My passion for wildlife conservation, animal welfare and connecting with nature is what fuels and influences my art and art making practices today. Inspired by the Old Masters, I predominantly use non-toxic oils, archival plant based acrylic alternative paint and mixed media, but I also enjoy drawing with various different mediums and dabbling with watercolour too. Some say you should stick to one medium, but I think it’s more important to do what brings you joy. Creative freedom is what brings me joy and I believe it shows in the art.

Creating my art and spending time in nature has been like therapy for me, allowing me to heal from past traumas and reconnect with myself. I truly believe that this renewed strength and self-love energy is flowing into my paintings.

My Mission

I don’t just want to make art.

I want to make a difference.

Since learning about wildlife conservation, animal cruelty and the environmental devastation that is happening all around the world, I realised that in order to make a real difference, I also had to consider how my daily living habits contribute to that. I started to ask myself: ‘How can I create art to help animals and nature, by using materials that have derived from animal suffering or that are contributing towards damage to the environment?’ From that moment on, I decided to source and use eco and vegan friendly art materials wherever possible, to the best of my knowledge. This has included switching from acrylic paint to a high quality, archival, eco friendly plant based alternative which looks and behaves just the same. This has enabled me to minimise damage caused to the environment without compromising on the quality of my artwork. I also choose to use non-toxic oil paints, often mixing my own with just pigment and oil. I only use vegan friendly paint brushes and have sourced non-toxic, archival varnish to varnish my paintings.

In alignment with my values and core beliefs, I pledge to donate a minimum of 10% of all profits from my art to various wildlife conservation charities, animal welfare charities and sanctuaries.

Therefore, by supporting my journey and work, you can be a part of that too and together, we can help create positive changes for animals and the planet and make a difference.

Thank you for all of your support, it means the world to me (and to the animals!)

~ Soph x