Arturo Kameya

Arturo Kameya’s work examines the narratives and myths that comprise different versions of socio-political history of Peru. Kameya works with various mediums, including: acrylic, plaster, film, and printmaking. His multimedia artworks are often arranged together to create large-scale installations that delineate connections between disparate historical events, by linking together a range of visual cultural languages which have been formed over time. Recent works closely examine the fabric of contextualized urban environments, while embracing the contradictions that come with knowing a place intimately. His work has garnered increasing attention in recent years for attentive and direct critical depictions of his native country Peru, that narrate both the troubling and familiar aspects of life there.

"Childhood memories, scenes from Lima’s suburbs where the artist grew up in the 1990s, family traditions and popular culture often form the point of departure of Arturo’s artworks. These sources lead to intriguing groups of related, finely detailed paintings, installations and, occasionally, videos. [...] Arturo’s work feels both familiar and unknown at the same time. Yet all elements seem to relate. They find each other in a carefully composed idiom constructed by gentle looking forms and by soft pastel and grayish, slightly muted, colors. [...] Arturo’s artworks may looklike mementos or witnesses from a bygone era, which addssomething bittersweet, in between nostalgia, a painful sentimentand a celebration of the past."
- excerpt from Turning history downside up by Madelon van Schie, Who can afford to feed more ghosts, 2021

Arturo Kameya (b. 1984 in Lima, PE) attended the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru in Lima (PE) and was a resident at the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten, Amsterdam (NL). He is the winner of the De Wolvecampprijs 2024.
GRIMM Amsterdam (NL) is currently showing a solo exhibition by the artist titled The moon wanted to be the sun, but it was too late to change. Following this, he will have a solo presentation at Centre d’Art Saint-Fons, CAP, Lyon (FR) opening in Fall 2025.

Solo exhibitions include: Opaque Spirits, Marres, Maastricht (NL); Los Ovnis, GRIMM, New York, NY (US); En esa pulga se mezcla nuestra sangre / In that flea, our blood mixes, GRIMM, New York, NY (US); Drylands, Dordrechts Museum, Dordrecht (NL);Grandma’s Cooking Recipes, GRIMM, Amsterdam (NL); Depósito de Sombras, Alliance Française, Lima (PE); Allá en el Caserío, Acá en el Matorral (with Claudia Martínez Garay) Ginsberg Galeria, Lima (PE); Ghosts Don’t Care if You Believe in Them, Hotel Maria Kapel, Hoorn (NL); Ghost Stories, Alliance Française, Lima (PE); Ciencia Ficción, Wu Gallery, Lima (PE); Land at the End of the Sea (with Claudia Martínez Garay), Galería del Centro Cultural Británico de San Juan de Lurigancho, Lima (PE).

Selected group exhibitions: Prospect.6: The Future Is Present, The Harbinger Is Home, New Orleans, LA (US) in 2024; Memory is an Editing Station, 22nd BiennialSesc_Videobrasil, São Paulo (BR) in 2023; We, on the Rising Wave, Busan Biennale (SK) in 2022 and at Soft Water Hard Stone, the fifth New Museum Triennial, New York, NY (US) in 2021.

Kameya's work is part of numerous collections including the ABN AMRO Collection (NL); AkzoNobel Art Foundation, Amsterdam (NL); Beth Rudin DeWoody Collection (US); THE EKARD COLLECTION; ING Collection (NL); Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami, FL (US); Museo de Arte de Lima, MALI (PE) and Saastamoinen Foundation (FI).