Transmission: An Interview with Artist Sof Romera

There’s a raw energy in the moment just after graduating, when nothing is fixed and everything matters. For queer artists especially, this threshold holds both uncertainty and urgency, a moment suspended between what has been and what could be. These conversations capture artists on the cusp, still carrying the intensity of making under pressure, and beginning to shape what kind of future they might insist into being.

As part of our ongoing conversations with queer graduating students from UCA (University for the Creative Arts) about their degree show work, we spoke with Sof Romera. Their work took the form of a mobile cabinet of curiosities: part shrine, part love letter, part archive. Centred around intimate objects, memories, and the people they care for, Sof’s practice is grounded in collecting, storytelling, and queer ritual. Influenced by folk traditions, personal altars, and grassroots spaces, their work is both deeply personal and part of a broader effort toward cultural preservation. In this interview, Sof reflects on building tenderness into material form, trans representation, and what it means to create spaces shaped by care, community, and sacred mess.

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Pup and Tiger: Your piece in the exhibition was a sort of cabinet of curiosities, can you tell us a little about the work and this idea?

Sof Romera: I’m quite the hoarder and quite the hermit and I have an obsession with collecting and archiving which I think is insanely important. I find a lot of fulfilment in depicting people I’m close with and intimate moments. With Wunderkammer meaning “room of wonders” I wanted to depict the people I know/care for within cabinets alongside items of their desire, things that resemble their “self” or memories I hold for them. I made this one, which I feel is a prototype, for my lover, my muse, which is carried around and displayed within my artist case which I think is pretty fitting. It contains all messy, mushy and esoteric.

PT: What drew you to make this kind of work?

SR: It’s definitely something I want to take forward and develop into a series of works with more care and craftsmanship. I want to get into so many things but for this project I’d like to start up woodworking and up cycling/modifying found or second-hand items. I liked the idea of people as altars without deities or gods and showcasing all sorts of personal and private rituals. I was inspired by visiting collections, people’s personal spaces, antique shops, charity shops and my own online research; shrines found in bullet cartridges and how people managed to bring that sacredness into every day in the face of how alienating and unknown life can feel. I was also inspired by my own tendencies and my living space looking like a glorious junkshop. Couple and collectors Charles Leslie and Fritz Lohman, were and are, a massive source of inspiration for this work and me in general, they collected a load of queer art from across cultures exploring many nuances and preserving it during the AIDS epidemic. They used their attic as a space for their collections and for artists to exhibit in until they opened The Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art.

PT: Has your work changed a lot during your time at university? How do you think it’s grown or shifted?

SR: I’ve gained an enormous love for lino printing. I’ve felt a bit stagnant along the way, but I’ve had many meaningful experiences in these last years that have definitely changed how I want to live my life unabashedly.

PT: What’s something you’re feeling curious or excited about now, in your art or just in general?

SR: I find a lot of fulfilment basing my work on the queer lens, intimacy, eroticism, trans representation, queer art history + archives and mythology + folktales. I’m excited to build it up. I definitely want to delve into some grassroots movements and creating within and for the community more. Ben Saunders is a trans artist/ceramist I love from Manchester. I got shortlisted for his STRAP magazine this year which contains many depictions of trans masc and non-binary erotica, kink and euphoria. He runs a dildo painting workshop that I dream to attend, queer markets and life drawing supporting sex workers and dancers in movement. There is also neon life drawing up in London that I really want to visit where the models are covered in neon body paint and the artists are given neon pens. I would love to be part of co-creating some spaces like these. I really want to make my own queer zines, posters, flyers, some being some protest art.

PT: Are there any artists, writers, films, or music that have been feeding into your practice lately?

SR: I’ve been inspired by many smaller independent artists on Instagram teefee (etchings, prints), withapencilinhand2… Many an erotic artist! I have been listening to a lot of Talking Heads and Kraftwerk lately and have been binge watching the Mighty Boosh and Adventure Time. Massive fan of folk Sam Lee, I got the privilege to see him perform with ILĀ (co-founder of trans voices) on one of my last birthdays down in Folkestone. He travels across England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales collecting folk songs from travelling camps making an online archive of these almost forgotten tales, recording the person unveiling them to him, and making a version with his own approach. I find folk to be beautifully queer with how anyone can sing from the other person’s perspective regardless of whose tale it is and who they are, I think it’s why it’s one of my favourite genres.

PT: What’s something you wish people knew or understood better about your work?

SR: I feel like I’m still figuring out my style but I’m dead set on what I love and what/who I want to portray and represent. There’s a lot of getting myself out there, taking up space, connecting with the community and giving into being out, along with much experimentation to be done, but I’m really excited to see myself reach potentials that I’ve previously felt hindered by.

PT: Finally, where can people follow your work or see more of what you’re doing?

SR: Folks can follow my progress on Instagram at aif.0.s. I really appreciate being given the space to talk, elated and it’s wonderful seeing Pup and Tiger come together alongside many a talented creator!!

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Transmissions is an ongoing series from Pup and Tiger, spotlighting voices across queer art and cultural practice. We publish interviews, essays, and experimental texts that offer space for artists to speak in their own words and on their own terms.

Pup and Tiger is a queer-led art space and project platform based in Canterbury, UK. We champion emerging practices, experimental forms, and collective cultural work rooted in care, resistance, and reimagining.

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Jared Pappas-Kelley is an artist, writer, and co-founder of Pup and Tiger. His work has appeared in Art Monthly, The Guardian, 3:AM Magazine, Cabinet, and The Rumpus. He is the author of Solvent Form: Art and Destruction, To Build a House That Never Ceased, and Stalking America. Pappas-Kelley has curated exhibitions internationally and has led several independent art spaces and collaborative initiatives, including Critical Line, Tollbooth, and Don’t Bite the Pavement.