Sam van Strien participates in NARS Foundation International Residency Program

Fri, Sep 1 - Wed, Sep 20  2023

London-based Dutch artist Sam van Strien will be an artist-in-residence at the NARS Foundation in New York City from July to September 2023. The residency will culminate in an exhibition at NARS from September 1st – September 20th. The Opening Reception and Open Studios will take place on September 1, 6-8pm.

About the exhibition

Featuring works by Jake Couri, Marilla Cubberley, Hannah Ehrlich, Sihan Guo, Heather Harvey, Hannah Hill, Juyon Lee, Zoya Manan, Tamar Nissim, Jean Oh, Abed Shalabi, Sara Sowell, and Sam van Strien. Through painting, textiles, film, and sculpture, the thirteen artists in residence explore ideas of identity, memory, psychology, and site-specificity. From dense handwoven tapestries, to shellacked orange peels, the works in this exhibition invite viewers to examine their own interior lives, and the ways our exterior reality is shaped by what is repressed, and what is revealed.

About the artist

Sam van Strien, a visual artist captivated by the relationship between architecture and human experience, employs two-dimensional mediums to explore the role of three-dimensional spaces in our lives. With a keen eye for detail and a deep curiosity about the interplay between space and perception, Sam’s art practice utilizes techniques such as rubbings from buildings, laser-cut engravings of photographs, and drawings sourced from archival records.

This residency at the NARS Foundation will offer Sam a unique opportunity to reflect on modern architecture and finance in Manhattan, one of the financial centers of the world. This builds on his previous work, which explored the relationship between modern architecture and finance in Canary Wharf, London. Sam will conduct archival research of Manhattan’s corporate architecture at Columbia University’s Avery Library and MOMA’s Architecture amp; Design Study Center to question the relationship between historical documentation and personal experience. Sam’s first-hand experiences will become the basis of his work at the NARS Foundation, setting the stage for an encounter between the archival and the personal experience of architecture.

Sam van Strien holds an MFA in Painting & Drawing from Ohio State University (2017) and a BA in Fine Art from Central Saint Martins (2014). His artwork has been showcased internationally, including at venues such as Trinity Buoy Wharf in London, UK; Keumsan Gallery in Seoul, South Korea; Podium in Oslo, Norway; and Urban Arts Space in Columbus, OH, USA. Sam has completed prestigious residencies, most recently at PADA in Lisbon, Portugal and USF Arts Centre in Bergen, Norway. His artistic achievements have been recognized through prestigious accolades, including an Arts Council England Grant, the Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize, and the Netherland-America Foundation Cultural Grant.

The residency is supported by the Netherland-America Foundation and Arts Council England.