Michal-Sophia Tobiass, France
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Michal-Sophia Tobiass is a visual artist and choreographer based in Paris. Her creative process is almost always rooted in a personal need for healing and reparation. Her work explores, among other things, the rituals of various civilizations with different modes of visual and symbolic expression, including prehistoric art, ancient Egyptian art, and proto-prehistoric periods.
By collaborating with specialized researchers, she studies symbolic sites such as Mount Bégo, the Fontainebleau forest, and the caves of the Dordogne, revealing the profound links between these rituals, the stars, and geological landscapes. Her practice establishes a dialogue between the earth, the sky, and the transition from life to death, inviting reflection on humanity's relationship with the cosmos while weaving together ancestral traditions and contemporary expression. Meet artist Michal-Sophia Tobiass and curator Sabrina Scher at the Atelier 11 Open Studio event on February 21st, 2026. |
Photo: Goni Riskin
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Michal-Sophia’s work is almost always born from a personal need for healing and repair—a process she then seeks to share with others. During her residency, she will create an installation featuring sculptures woven from vetiver roots alongside salt paintings. At the heart of this project is vetiver, a plant she discovered while seeking natural support for the physical and emotional experiences she undergoes before and during menstruation.
For twelve days surrounding each cycle, she drinks a vetiver root infusion daily, using twelve roots in total per cycle. This ritual, repeated month after month, has become a space of stillness, centering, and profound peace. Because the plant accompanies and sustains her, she felt a calling to honor it through sculpture. She envisions her work as a tribute to a femininity in search of healing—finding calm at the very heart of its own strength.
For twelve days surrounding each cycle, she drinks a vetiver root infusion daily, using twelve roots in total per cycle. This ritual, repeated month after month, has become a space of stillness, centering, and profound peace. Because the plant accompanies and sustains her, she felt a calling to honor it through sculpture. She envisions her work as a tribute to a femininity in search of healing—finding calm at the very heart of its own strength.
