Samuel Sarmiento

Samuel Sarmiento (Venezuela, 1987) is a self-taught artist who lives and works in Aruba. He incorporates storytelling in his ceramics, painted sculptures, drawings, and installations. His work zooms in on all aspects of humanity, following the lines of religion, (cultural) history, colonialism, and migration. He enjoys reinterpreting Caribbean oral traditions, myths, and folk stories, and explores the colonial history of South-America, including the Caribbean Netherlands. In his symbolically charged and layered works, Sarmiento depicts how people relate to each other, to their history, and to their environment. His painted sculptures always communicate a sense of unity: everything and everyone is connected.

At least once a year, Stedelijk Museum Schiedam invests in the acquisition of an artwork and the realization of a presentation by an artist who lives and/or works in the Caribbean part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. To this end, we previously collaborated with the artists Gilleam Trapenberg, Mandy Franca, Felix de Rooy, Serana Angelista, TARONA, David Bade, Carlos Blaaker, Eugenie Boon, Avantia Damberg, Tirzo Martha, and Shertise Solano. For our 2027 collaboration we selected the Aruba-based artist Samuel Sarmiento.

Samuel Sarmiento, The Hunters of Clay and Gold, 2024

This will be Samuel Sarmiento’s first solo exhibition in the Netherlands. His work was previously included in the exhibition Pioneering Ceramics (2024) at Museum Prinsenhof Delft. He performed residencies at the EKCW in Oisterwijk and the Van Gogh AiR Foundation in Zundert, and collaborated with CBK Zuidoost in Amsterdam on multiple occasions. Sarmiento’s work was furthermore presented during the h3h biennial in Oosterhout (2025). This exhibition will be curated by Nanda Janssen.