Sophie Varin’s oil miniatures are glimpses into a world full of intrigue and ambivalence The strange characters in Sophie’s paintings want to dissolve into their surroundings and to look without being seen. Words For French artist Sophie Varin, her first foray into painting came later than most. After studying at the National School of Fine Arts in Paris, then at Hunter College in New York, and then finally at the Piet Zwart Institute in Rotterdam – all of which mostly revolved around sculpture – she stumbled upon this untapped medium. She can’t recall exactly how, but after writing a “detective story that dealt with fiction, plot and suspense” for her thesis, she felt the impulse to pick up a paintbrush.