Sonya Sklaroff (November 7, 1970 - present) is a contemporary American painter best known for her cityscapes of New York City.
Born in Philadelphia, Sklaroff attended the prestigious Friends' Central School before going on to earn her BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD). While at RISD, Sklaroff won the Providence Art Award and was selected for the European Honors Program, where she studied under Friedrich St.Florian. Sklaroff later earned her MFA from the Parsons School of Design in New York City where she studied under Faith Ringgold and Glenn Goldberg. While a student at Parsons, Sklaroff received a grant from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the World Views program, which provided her an artists studio on the 91st floor of Tower 1 of the World Trade Center.
Sklaroff's early works were primarily on representational views of cityscapes and landscapes with a focus on the relationship between negative space, complementary colors, and contrast between light and dark. More recent works, while still exploring these themes, have included greater detail and more prominently feature scenes including people and traffic. A 2009 New York exhibition of Sklaroff's work was reviewed in the Winter 2010 edition of American Arts Quarterly, which wrote, "What gives her work its unique interest and power is her clever sense of color contrasts, along with reflections of light, depictions of shadows and smoky atmospheres."
The American Arts Quarterly article also noted, "Although she also paints country landscapes and interiors, she is best known for her images of New York City." Her cityscapes are particularly noted for her inclusion of New York City's water towers, which display an almost anthropomorphic character. Many of her landscape paintings have been produced either in Maine, where she visits Monhegan Island or nearby areas almost annually, or the American Southwest, where she has been an artist in residence at the Santa Fe Art Institute.
Sklaroff was the subject of an eight page article in the April 2010 issue of American Artist magazine; the article, written by Linda S. Price, is titled Approaching Art with the Intensity of an Athlete. Sklaroff is quoted as saying, "My theory of being an artist is that I'm an athlete and have to keep in shape all the time, so I'm always painting and drawing--especially figure drawing--to keep my skills up." Echoing the comments in American Arts Quarterly, Price wrote, "Although her work is highly realistic, Sklaroff tends to focus on the abstract shapes when she paints. 'I often lose myself in a painting, forgetting the objects themselves,' she says."
Other media accounts of Sklaroff's work include articles in The New York Times reviewing a show and about her residency at the Santa Fe Art Institute.
Her work is currently displayed in the Jenkins Johnson Galleries (New York and San Francisco), the Cavalier Galleries (Nantucket, MA and Greenwich, CT), and Galerie Sparts (Paris). Collections with her works include the United States Department of Homeland Security, Fannie Mae, the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, the Cahoon Museum of American Art, the Consul General of France (in New York City), and the Art Bank Program of the US State Department.
One of Sklaroff's paintings was used as the cover of the Summer 2009 issue of City Journal magazine. Another painting of Sklaroff's was featured on the cover of Ravi Shankar's Voluptuous Bristle in April 2010. Sklaroff was also included in New American Paintings: 15th Anniversary Edition published in early 2010 by Open Studios Press. Sklaroff was interviewed by MyArtSpace.com in November 2007. Her work is also featured on a series of cards from Bay View Press.
The Sofitel New York currently hosts an installation of Sklaroff's work in their gallery; other recent exhibitions included a Fall 2011 solo show at the Sparts Gallery in Paris as well as a solo show in Spring 2011 at Galerie Anagama in Versailles, France. Sklaroff and her exhibition in Versailles were featured in the May 2011 issue of Elle Deco magazine.