About the artist
Sam Fein is an interdisciplinary artist whose creative practice encompasses painting, drawing, text, curatorial practice, and social activism. Her work explores human relations and emotional conditions within social frameworks of power. Drawing upon her upbringing in the American Southwest, Fein fuses memory and imagination with present-day events. These densely-layered narratives integrate psychosocial research, allegory, anecdote, and magical realism. The result is a form of visual storytelling that is both comedic and bizarre. Bold colors, quirky characters, and whimsical scenes contrast a darker psychological underpinning, creating an unsettling reality.
Sam Fein holds a Master of Fine Arts from the Mount Royal School of Art at the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA). She received her B.A. from Sarah Lawrence College with academic concentrations in the Visual Arts, Spanish, and the Social Sciences. As an undergraduate she studied abroad at universities in Cuba and Argentina.
Fein's artwork has been exhibited at The American Visionary Art Museum (Baltimore, MD), Smack Mellon (Brooklyn, NY), Hillyer Art Space (Washington, D.C.), and Kingston Gallery (Boston, MA). She has been awarded residencies to the Vermont Studio Center, MASS MoCA, and was the James Rosenquist AIR at North Dakota State University. She was awarded a curatorial fellowship through an international open call from ApexArt.
Prior to graduate school, Fein spent a year as a Fulbright Scholar in the Philippines and completed ethnographic research on the substance use behavior of high-risk juvenile populations. In addition to her creative practice, she works as an educator and community organizer.
Born and raised in Tucson, Arizona, she lives and works in the Boston area.