Soft and Heavy focuses on works on paper by the artist created between 2021 and 2022, a period of intense studio time for the artist. Primarily a painter, Sarmiento devotes time in the studio daily to work on paper, not as studies for paintings or larger works but as a unique practice where different ideas and techniques can evolve over time. The pieces in the show introduce the artist’s practice through his engagement with paper at a time when the contemporary art canon primarily focuses on the medium of painting on canvas as an essential and central marker of an artist’s output.

Sarmiento’s artworks promote questions of tradition, identity, and the idea of preservation while simultaneously speaking to his evolving studio practice. Work like Vaya Con Dios, 2022 a watercolor with energetic, applications of colors in homage to imagery and specific artworks pulled from the artist’s heritage are central to the exhibition. A meticulous color palette is used to render the work as both a historical representation of the image of the snake in Mestizo Mexican art and a contemporary representation of that same image.

Sigue Feliz, 2022 another large-scale watercolor pulls from a series of works by the artist on canvas and paper of Mestizo Mexican and Ecuadorian vessels and vases. The works oscillate from faithful representations of historical objects to new creations by the artist built through his research and engagement with traditional artistic practices and objects of his dual cultural identities. Each of Sarmiento’s watercolors show an evolved understanding of the medium with the use of color working to render the vessels, faces, and creatures featured in the works in a muted tone.

In addition to watercolors, the artworks in Soft and Heavy present a series of large-scale oil pastel drawings from Sarmiento, where his use of rich colors and expressive strokes show a mastery of the medium. Works like Don’t Look Back, 2022, and Sun Gazing, 2022 utilize oil pastels to heighten color in the work. Each application allowing light to catch the works beautifully, illuminating the alter-like nature of each work on paper.

There is an instinctual quality to how Sarmiento applies the oil pastel sticks to the works on paper with his strokes, and use of vivid primary colors recalling the works of artists known for their work in abstraction like Karl Appel and Eddie Martinez, while the forms he creates build up over time to form representations unique to the artist’s hand even when pulling from existing cultural imagery and objects. Sarmiento’s juxtaposition between the soft applications of watercolor to the heavy application of pastel creates a visual language in conversation with each other while showing two distinct sides of a multi-faceted artist’s evolution.