A Conversation with Painting Students Sam Werkhoven and Simon Scharinger

FMI Graduation Show 2026 Interview Series

By Olivia Niuman

I interviewed two colleagues of mine from the Painting department, Sam Werkhoven and Simon Scharinger, about their relationship to the notions of image and material, the difference between painting and drawing, and what they will present at the graduation show at the A-Kerk in June.  

Sam works with imagery of moments from his daily life that stop his gaze. “That doesn't mean that I only use what I see on the street, but also things that I recognize because of experiences that I've had or memories that are lingering in my mind. And because of that, there's a collision with something. It could be when I am in a museum and I see a painting of someone else that I think is really interesting that I take a snapshot of, or pictures that my father sends me of his trip to Spain, or kitchen scenes.” He added later, “it's often about a certain importance of a moment that I want to hold on to in a way, and I acknowledge that through the act of making.” Despite their different archives, Sam sees a similar act of acknowledgement in Simon's engagement with images. 

Simon works with an archive built from diagnostic images sourced from medical archives, medical book illustrations, publicly available archives, as well as images of his own or that have been sent to him by colleagues, family, and friends. “I engage with it in the sense that I barely understand the images that are in front of me. On the one hand, they have a certain visual clarity inherent. Your body or the inside of your body is totally exposed. But on the other hand, especially as someone who is not a medical professional that is not trained to read and interpret these images, for me they appear very abstract and hard to read, hard to understand, hard to grasp. 

“Nevertheless, you have a very tangible feeling and relationship with them. Even if you can’t necessarily pin down what you're looking at, there's always this strange notion that somehow you can locate it, even if it's someone else's body.” 

I asked them how they conceptualize this translation of the source image into a finished work, through their chosen material.  

“I often see my work as a residue of the imagery that I use,” Sam answered. “In my current practice, I use a lot of charcoal and paper –  greys and blacks on white. So there's already a big translation going from that initial image, the thing that I've seen, that I've looked at, into this material form. And I think that the charcoal and the velvet quality of it is, for me, very important, that it is present.” 

“In terms of achieving or developing a material presence in my work,” Simon shared, “in the beginning, I keep a very open mind. I have the feeling that a lot of decisions are then informed by working with the material and through the material. Meaning that, in the initial setup and research, everything is allowed.” 

Throughout the course of the study, Sam and Simon have both reduced their use of color. For Sam, color has been totally reduced to a palette of tonal grays and blacks. Simon also reduced his color to only black pigments for a while, and has been gradually and selectively reintroducing certain colors. For both of them, the reduction / elimination of color has brought a certain clarity.  

“I have a difficult relationship with color because I’m color blind,” Sam shared. “So I have to be analytical about which pigments are in the tube and how they would interact with other pigments. With these drawings, there was a nice outcome that it's reduced to only shadow, and the light is the paper.” 

Simon added, “It's a very interesting journey to only work with black because it makes everything else stand out more, like the texture of the material you're using or the compositions, for example. You have to find a lot of formal solutions to help yourself out because you only work with light and shadow, and maybe different textures or applications, depending on the medium you are using.”  

In addition to reducing the use of color, both artists also reduced or eliminated the use of paint itself. I asked them about how their relationship to the medium of painting has changed, considering our context of currently graduating from a program specifically oriented around the notion of painting. 

Simon responded that he personally began to see less of a real difference between painting and drawing. “Retrospectively, I sometimes wonder if the way I was handling paint and using my brush was actually much more like drawing.”  

“Especially here in the painting department” Simon added, “During the seminars, you develop much more of a sensibility for how an image develops a presence. It doesn't matter so much if you're sanding wood, cutting into plexiglass, or using paper or canvas.”

“You could think of painting as a way of seeing,” Sam remarked. “That has become much more apparent here during this Master. For me, it is about how you engage with the world, more than only the surface or a brush or paint.” 

The formal logic of the original source image is re-examined as the artist interacts with it through their material, whether it is with paint or dry media.  Sam drew a comparison between his work and Simon’s. “For you,” he said to Simon, “You work with images that feel very distant because they have a specific function, but your material engagement makes them more intimate while not revealing what they actually are. In a way, I work with the distance that inherently exists in mediated images: following photographic logic allows me to create clarity and recognition of the moment or image I want to capture. That’s an interesting difference, because how this distance is resolved in different ways says a lot about how each of us deals with the world around us.”  

“I think it's so beautiful that painting or drawing can carry this doubt and uncertainty and that there is something that pulls us in, but it's never fully resolved,” Simon added. “how a drawing or a painting can hold these juxtapositions and these paradoxes: simultaneously holding the distance of seeing while still bringing it closer.”  

At graduation, Simon will show five paintings, all two meters tall with different widths. “They're all based on my research, which is called Who is Afraid of the Image? The results of the research are the paintings titled Hiding in Plain Sight.” The paintings will be located in the choir in a half-circle, so “when you, as the viewer, on the one hand, are standing in the centre, you get an overview where all the paintings come together in a supercomposition, and on the other hand, you need to change position and get close to see the individual paintings”  

Sam’s work will also be arranged in a half-circle, spanning the outer wall that curves around the choir. He will make an installation, titled What the Magpie Found, composed of different combinations of drawings that unfold in groups, almost like phrases or words unfolding as one reads a page, as the viewer will also traverse the installation from left to right. “For me, it’s a very interesting opportunity to work with a space like that, with all its connotations and difficulties and beautiful light that comes with it. It’s also interesting because of the role of imagery in churches, especially churches in this part of the Netherlands where, of course, imagery has been removed.” 

Sam and Simon’s work will be on view at the Frank Mohr Institute Graduation Show at the A-Kerk in Groningen from 25-28 June, 2026. For more interviews, information, and details about the students and their graduation work, keep an eye on the event page on our website and follow us on Instagram.