‘I want to hang the show like a jamboree’, says Sophie Mortimer of her French House exhibition

THEY are works that capture daily life in Soho… and are now due to grace one of the West End’s best loved institutions.

Artist Sophie Mortimer has known Soho all her life and now her works covering the area – alongside the Parisian district of St Germain – are set for a major exhibition at the French House, the landmark pub in Dean Street.

Sophie’s work pairs the Soho she grew up in with the cafés and squares of St Germain. They include imagery of the French House terrace and its regulars, the Algerian Coffee Stores, Bar Italia, Soho Patisserie and four seasonal views of Soho Square.

Sophie said: “My parents were Soho types. They were members of the Colony Rooms and as a schoolgirl I’d be taken here with my sister.”

The Colony’s famous landlady, Muriel Belcher, was friends with her family and Belcher’s girlfriend, Carmel, would hand the young Sophie pocket money.

She added: “When my friends were doing their homework, I’d be at the Colony Rooms, being looked after by Francis Bacon and meeting Frank Auberbach. It felt rather special.”

Her father was a photographer who worked for various magazines. She said: “I drew from an early age and it felt very natural to capture the scenes I saw around me.”

The show brings together imagery from Soho landmarks and those of St Germain.

Sophie said: “I went to Paris in my late teens and I drew in bars and cafés. Back in London I created Soho scenes.”

Her works can be found in the collections of Sir Tom Stoppard, the Getty family and Lord Lambton, and are partly influenced by two brilliant London illustrators who became mentors: David Gentleman and Paul Cox.

She added: “David was a family friend and he spoke to me down the years about the palette of colours he uses. Paul Cox was my tutor at Camberwell and he would take us out and ask us to create drawings at speed. He really pushed me.”

Other influences include two great 20th-century artists who studied London life, Ronald Searle and Edward Ardizzone.

Sophie added: “Searle did an early Paris sketchbook, which I copied as a student. I love both of them.” She is hanging her work at the French House this week for an opening night on Sunday, and added: “I sat down and watched people from a corner of a bar. I always go back to draw Soho Square. One of my first ever breakthrough drawings was this iconic, one and only tucked-away idyll in the busiest part of London. Soho Square, like the French House, grounds me. I am always drawn to it in every sense, it has architecture, nature, busy life, wildness, danger, calmness, noise and peace, all in one. Familiar and unknown, order and chaos together.”

“And I want to hang the show like a jamboree. We’ll see how many we can fit.”

• Soho and St Germain: Sophie Mortimer is at The French House, 49 Dean Street, Soho, W1D 5BG from Sunday October 11.