Salt Spring Island Archives
Sophie King was an artist of many mediums, though she focused primarily on woodwork and sculpture. She was also skilled in bone carving, oil painting, and many sorts of fancywork.
Artmaking became a regular practice in Sophie’s retired years. Her final collection filled her home and overflowed onto her property, and this “driftwood museum” quickly drew publicity from local newspapers, islanders, and early tourists who would travel to see her work.
Most of Sophie’s sculptures represented animals: many of them native to the west coast: eagles, sea lions, baby deer, bears, and various birds. Some more unique attempts were creatures like the dinosaurs, giraffes, or portraits. Along with these colourful, playful pieces, she made more abstract ones: strange driftwood shapes perched on pedestals that appreciated the beauty of nature’s work.
Visitors also noted bone carvings like totems made from fish vertebrae, and flowers made from thin pieces cut off the end of an old soup-bone.
Sophie was adamant on keeping her works a collection, and never sold her works individually, though many asked to buy them. “Hundreds of tourists come to see my carvings every year. They beg me to sell some pieces in my collection, but I can’t bear to.” She sold the collection as a whole to Bob Akerman, who promised to put all her art into his museum.
Sophie’s work remained there until his passing. Most of the collection is now stored in the Salt Spring Archives.
