Queen Beatrix International Airport has a reputation for being nightmarish in a way that, I’m glad to say, didn’t align with my experience of traveling to and from Aruba. Then again, I visited well outside the peak mid-December to mid-April season—so who knows what horrors await those chasing Carnival and sub-90 temperatures. But I like it hot, so Aruba’s weather works for me all twelve months of the year. And anyway, I’m here for the art fair.
For many, the phrase “art fair” conjures something specific: a maze of white-walled booths where dealers and buyers parley in hushed tones over five- and six-figure deals. The atmosphere? Upscale. The art? Exclusive. Aruba Art Fair, by contrast, is intentionally inclusive. Beyond the four curated spaces, booths line the streets of San Nicolas—any artist who wants to participate can participate.
But here’s the thing about art in Aruba more broadly: if you want to experience it outside the fair, you’ll have to put in more than a little effort. This isn’t exactly an arts destination… yet. If Aruba Art Fair founder Tito Bolivar has anything to say about it, it will be—and probably within a few short years. For now, I’ll be completely honest and say that researching art in Aruba for this story was a little frustrating. The island’s own website suggests visiting Unoca, “the island’s national gallery,” which definitely did exist at one point but doesn’t seem to anymore. Several gallery lists I find are actually lists of tattoo parlors. The island’s commercial galleries are mysteriously hard to find when you search for ‘Aruba art galleries.’ And as is often the case in smaller destinations, artist-run and retail galleries open and close with a frequency that makes putting together an arts itinerary in advance a challenge.
That said, art in Aruba isn’t confined to galleries. It’s in the hotel rooms. It’s on the walls of businesses. It’s in the caves. It looms over the roundabouts. It’s even on the houses—part of a tradition stemming from the 19th-century Indigenous artisan Simon Donata and later refined by Janchi Christiaans and Goy Semeleer, who are credited with popularizing the Cas Floria (decorated houses) style. I’m here to see all the art I can find in Aruba and to see it all on my own, though don’t take that to mean I’ll be lonely. I was traveling solo long before we could dull discomfort with a swipe of the screen, and I’m comfortable in new geographies with only my own thoughts for company. One thing I’m here to find out is what it’s like to travel alone in a destination that’s often marketed as a romantic escape.
Day 0
There’s a bunch of art in the arrivals hall but no placards. I figure it’ll be easy to find more information now that I’m here, and maybe I’m not trying hard enough, but the best I can dig up is that these works are by Aruban artists. One piece is definitely Elisa Lejuez Peters’ We Kiss the Joy as It Flies. And there’s a sculpture garden with work by Ciro Abath, Miriam de L’Isle, Ryan Oduber, Omaira Silva, Osaira Muyale, Gilbert Senchi and Stanley Kuiperi. But search results for Aruba airport art are dominated by the 2023 unveiling of a statue (also by Senchi) commemorating the island’s first seaplane landing in 1923. I drive past it after securing my rental, and it hits me as I’m going around yet another roundabout that this is only the second time I’ve driven in a foreign country. But it doesn’t feel all that foreign, since I live in Massachusetts, arguably the U.S. capital of roundabouts.
I’m headed to The West Deck for my first taste of Aruban cuisine, which I’ll later learn is a mashup of Indigenous, African, Dutch, South American and Asian influences with a heavy emphasis on seafood for obvious reasons. I park in a patch of shade I have to drive over the sidewalk to reach—from what I can tell, parking in some parts of Aruba can be a free-for-all. “Table for one,” I tell the hostess. (To the uninitiated, I say try solo dining at least once in your life. It’s delightful when you realize no one cares that you’re eating alone. At most, you’ll get some friendly, good-natured ribbing from waitstaff, which is what happens here, but it’s the kind of teasing that makes you feel not just welcome but at home.) The West Deck sits over Governor’s Bay Beach, a quiet stretch of white sand with more pelicans and terns than people. The sky is a painterly blue with picture-perfect clouds, and the airport’s runway is close enough for plane spotting but far enough away that all I hear is the gentle lapping of the waves..
I order passionfruit juice and tamarind juice, Trocadero garlic shrimp, salad and banana (which here means plantains), and I munch while thinking about what to do next. There are no art museums in Aruba, so I’m hunting for galleries and open studios. For fine arts, there are Tito Bolivar’s two commercial galleries in San Nicolas—ArtisA Gallery and Space21.art—both of which I’m scheduled to visit later. Artist Elisa Lejuez Peters has a gallery in Noord, open by appointment, but I’ll be meeting her at the fair. Most of what I find are the aforementioned retail galleries geared toward tourists—not really my thing. Interestingly, there are also several art cafés, including Aruflamingo in San Nicolas and Artitudes Art Cafe in Oranjestad. I wasn’t kidding when I said art is everywhere.
There’s even art at the donkey sanctuary, which is where I head next, operating under the assumption that my room at Bucuti & Tara Beach Resort couldn’t possibly be ready (it was). Donkey by Sandy Bruynzeel sits atop a concrete plinth in the enclosure where rescue donkeys and visitors are free to wander. It’s hot and dusty, and I’ve been up since 4 a.m. at this point, but I am in heaven because I’m hugging donkeys. Absolute loads of adorable donkeys. Whatever you are in Aruba for, make time to visit the donkeys—you will not regret it. Sadly, I do need to freshen up before my aloe scrub-making class at six, but I hug and pet as many donkeys as I can before climbing back in the car.
Check-in at Bucuti & Tara ruins me for all other check-ins. I’m halfway out of the rental with my suitcase when a porter appears with a cart. I say I’m checking in, he says my name into his earpiece and my luggage vanishes. I turn around, and there’s a concierge with an icy cold scented washcloth, which I wrap around my neck and, once we’re inside, she hands me a glass of champagne. During check-in, she takes my photo, and during my stay, I’m addressed by name several times without ever needing to give it. My bag is waiting in my room, along with a Bucuti & Tara water bottle, engraved champagne flutes and a selection of snacks. A large painting by Elisa Lejuez Peters hangs on the wall.
All around the property, as you might expect, I’m surrounded by couples. Couples in the pool. Couples walking by as I learn about the history of aloe in Aruba and make a custom sugar scrub with an aloe master from Royal Aruba Aloe. Couples working out together in the gym. (Note: I am a hotel gym connoisseur, and I can say without a doubt that Bucuti & Tara has the best and most well-appointed gym of any resort I’ve ever visited.) Couples dining at Elements, where I eat a fabulous dinner of corvina and drink several different mocktails while watching the sun set over the Caribbean. But far from feeling awkward, it means I’m in no danger of a friend or family group trying to adopt what they think is a sad solo traveler. Keep in mind I have two children and a husband and a dog, a cat, a rabbit and four chickens. Here in Aruba, I’m free: doing exactly what I want to do when I want to do it—a luxury all its own.
Day 1
I plan to eat breakfast at Bucuti & Tara or maybe Linda’s Dutch Pancake House in Noord, but I wake up before sunrise, drink too much coffee and lose any appetite I might have had. Instead, I hit the beach for a good long swim in the near-body-temperature water. The sun is already strong when I step out onto the dry sand and make my way to my reserved umbrella, where I have not one but two lounges upon which to recline. I eventually raise my red flag, which summons a blue-shirted waiter on a Segway. I order two smoothies. Why not?
I do, however, eventually have places to be—specifically, Studio Murano Art where I’m scheduled to take a glass-blowing class (there are also free glass-blowing demonstrations every day). Co-founder Giuliano Pinzan, who opened the studio near Ayo village in 2019, comes from an Italian family with roots in glass craftsmanship. I’m a little apprehensive about working with molten glass fresh out of a thousand-degree furnace, but it turns out that blowing glass is a team sport. I decide to make a thick-walled tumbler and choose my colors, and then I start working the black and white chunks into a blob of red-hot glass with help from Joshua before Giuliano steps in, and I’m rolling and blowing, rolling and blowing, just like in videos. It’s very cool to see my blob become a bubble and that bubble become a drinking glass. They tell me I’m catching on quickly, and I wonder if they say that to all the tourists, but my tumbler does turn out beautiful, so who’s to say?
By now, I’m starving, so when I see a food stand called La Neryi Snack, with a mascot that looks like an empanada, I flip a wild U-turn. This is the kind of thing I live for when I travel. What am I about to eat? I don’t know, but I’m excited to find out. It’s pastechi, and I buy three: one cheese, one meat, one chop suey. Delicious.
With a couple of hours to kill before my fair walkthrough, I head to Etnia Nativa. Open by appointment, which I pre-booked, this artsy attraction bills itself as “a living embodiment of Aruba’s blended culture.” (The island is smaller than Chicago but houses an astonishingly diverse population, with more than 140 nationalities represented.) It’s actually the home of artist August Anthony Croes and his wife, Silvia, and with artworks on every wall and in every corner, Etnia Nativa is very much a testament to Croes’ skill with his hands: the house was constructed almost entirely from salvaged materials—stones, wood, nails and screws he collected from construction site cleanups, with only the windows, doors, faucets and electrical fixtures bought new.
The tour itself is short, just about an hour, and our chat barely scratches the surface of Croes’ own work, which encompasses everything from the pottery and paintings mounted on the walls to the handcrafted frames that surround them. But if you’re looking for Aruban art, you’ll certainly find it here. “All the work I do has native Aruban inspiration,” he tells me. “For me, the story comes before the art. Then I try to crystallize the story into something material. Everything has a story—the clay I beat for pots, everything.” It also has native Aruban provenance; Croes prides himself on being something of a scavenger, whether he’s painting on salvaged upholstery or shaping clay from the island itself into pots modeled after archaeological finds. And alongside Croes’ artwork, there are artifacts from Aruba’s archaic and Caquetío populations: chipped hand axes used by early hunters-gatherers to open turtle shells and more polished tools that, according to Croes, reflect the more settled life of the Caquetío—the later indigenous people of Aruba—who practiced agriculture and ceramics rather than constant hunting.
Croes is passionate about many things beyond art: genealogy, archeology, politics, history—all of which we discuss as we stroll through his little living museum. “Culture is like strings—as soon as the strings break, it’s over,” he warns. “For Aruba, when the string breaks, it becomes just commercial land or a stationary cruise ship. Real culture doesn’t matter anymore—only cost and value.”
I mull that over as I head back to Bucuti & Tara to freshen up before driving nearly the length of the island to San Nicolas and the art fair for a Collector Preview Tour with curator Renwick Heronimo. When the fair launched in 2016, he explains, Bolivar initially hoped to attract international galleries by mimicking the typical fair model. “With the first edition, he realized this was going to be much more of a community-based endeavor. You have to build up your community, educate them and give them a platform for development to happen.” Heronimo does see the fair becoming more international in the next few years, “but for now, it’s very pluralistic—democratic in the sense that it allows many voices, different perspectives on art, and ways of enjoying art to be celebrated. That’s what makes this project special.”
Heronimo tells us that San Nicolas was once home to the world’s largest oil refinery—a true company town that prospered until Exxon dismantled the facility in 1985, leaving the community economically adrift. Today, there’s still talk of reopening the refinery, given that neighboring Venezuela holds the largest oil reserves in the Western Hemisphere. But tourism already accounts for a major portion of Aruba’s GDP, and the vision now is to transform San Nicolas into the island’s cultural capital. Aruba Art Fair—the culmination of Aruba Art Week—is just one part of that plan.
“Just imagine this town before—post-industrial decline, everyone leaving for Saudi Arabia or Curaçao for oil jobs,” Heronimo says. “Buildings were abandoned. I started working with the museums, and Tito started the art fair and the mural project. The minute the murals appeared, things started changing.” Cafés, cinemas, shops and restaurants began to reopen. “Tito’s philosophy is democratic, meaning not only the top artists get to participate. He believes everyone who wants to be an artist should be able to. You can exhibit outside, get feedback and develop your process. And then we approach the most prominent and promising artists and present them in the curated shows indoors.”
The curated sections of the fair span four gallery spaces, including an unused building at the edge of town that houses more conceptual and performance-based work. These include a relational aesthetic activation with Velvet Zoé Ramos with Diamonta Kock (which I miss) and a powerful immersive performance by Natusha Croes, along with a presentation by sisterly duo KIP Republic, which you might know from their 2025 production KINGS… COME HOME at New York’s Apollo Theater. Some of the most striking work in the curated galleries is by painter and sculptor Belinda de Veer, ceramicist Helen Hoes, glass artist and amateur archeological researcher Bernadette van der Klooster and painter Kim Violenes, though with 100 artists showing at the fair, it’s hard to keep track. There’s just a lot of great stuff here. I saw some familiar names in the galleries—Sandy Bruynzeel, Elisa Lejuez Peters—but I eventually buy two paintings by Mauricio Ruiz, who’s showing in a booth outside. Surprisingly, some artists whose work has been staged in the curated spaces opt for outdoor booths in subsequent years, including one who tells me that “being outside is nice, because you have more contact with people. They stop, they talk, they want to know something about your art.”
After the walkthrough, I ask Heronimo why Aruba doesn’t have an art museum. “If you look at the quality of the art being created here—the dynamism among artists each year—it’s inevitable that people will ask: how is it possible we don’t have an art museum?” he answers. And there are enough local collections, both contemporary and historical, to support one. (I later learn that in 2018, European collector Jan Mol offered to gift his private collection to Aruba as the seed for a national museum of contemporary art, but it’s unclear where the project landed.) We chat a little more about art scenes around the world, and then I wonder what opening Aruba up to more cultural tourism might mean for the island. “They’re already diversifying tourism—positioning Aruba as a family destination or a getaway for solo travelers,” Heronimo says. “But it needs to be controlled. If not, locals will be shut out. Growth needs to be managed. It’s going to be shocking for many people here. But in the meantime, we build museums, we create art. That’s the therapy. That’s the future.”
The fair officially opens at 7 p.m. and runs late, though I never make it to the closing bell. If commercial fairs are one kind of overwhelming, hybrid fairs are another. Aruba Art Fair is part exhibition, part arts festival and at least two parts block party, with multiple performance stages and street vendors. There’s a whole row of people selling handmade jewelry and a special installation of artworks made by women in Aruba’s prison system. I try to see everything and give it all equal weight—I want to understand where Aruba’s art scene is and where it’s headed—but by 9:30 p.m., I hit a wall. The party continues without me.
Day 2
I wake up early. Again. After a swim, I head to the breakfast buffet at Bucuti & Tara, where I learn that the funny black birds I see everywhere on the property love scrambled eggs. Drinking my banana juice on the Elements deck, I watch them dive-bomb a woman who skipped the recommended plate cover, while two more birds eye my plate from a safe distance. Breakfast is delightful, but I don’t overdo it because I’m scheduled to spend several hours in the company of an Isla Aruba guide, bouncing along dirt paths in Arikok National Park, the vast protected space that comprises approximately 20 percent of the island and almost the entire eastern coast. You don’t strictly need a guide to visit the reserve, which has ruins, lava fields, limestone crags, caves with paintings by the island’s native Arawak people and cacti galore, but driving to conchi, the famous natural pool, can be tricky, and the hiking is hot.
Our first stop is Quadirikiri Cave, which has two large dome-shaped chambers lit by natural skylights, Amerindian petroglyphs and a population of southern long-nosed bats. But Fontein Cave is what I’m really here to see. Behind the 200-year-old graffiti scratched into the ceiling by European visitors are Arawak drawings that are at least a thousand years old. “We don’t know their meanings, but we know they depict plants, humans, animals and sometimes combinations—like visionary symbols,” my guide tells me. “Shamans were said to come in spiritual form, not human form, to make the drawings.”
It’s awe-inspiring to stand where the island’s ancient artists stood, and I wish I could spend more time here. As I’m basking in the art, my guide points out a trio of blue land crabs nestled in the crags and then casually mentions their neighbor, the giant yellow-leg centipede. I spot it at the base of a rock formation; it is literally a foot long, and just like that, I’m ready to move on.
Next up, a Garra rufa fish pedicure at the island’s only natural freshwater pond, where we have a delightful encounter with a random herd of goats, and then it’s off to the natural pool. Conchi is usually serene, but today it’s roiling. Waves crash over the rocks; currents pull strong from the south. I splash in anyway, swimming against the push of the waves to climb to the calmer “hot tub” on the opposite side, where I snorkel, spotting spiny urchins and anemones clinging to the rocks. Juvenile angelfish dart around below; crabs navigate the rocks above. The windy-day surf might not be ideal, but I have the natural pool to myself for a good quarter of an hour.
On the drive back, I sit up front and chat with my guide about raising kids, travel and what it’s like to grow up quadrilingual—as most Arubans do. I tell him I’m jealous. Most Americans barely manage one other language, and I can’t help but wonder what we’ve lost because of that.
Next on my itinerary is the famous Zeerovers—part seafood shack, part rite of passage. Getting there is easy. Parking is another story: it’s another sandy lot with no marked spaces and an anything-goes vibe. When I arrive, the line is nearly out the door, and it only grows longer as I wait. By the time I reach the window where you order today’s catch by the pound, I’m hot, hangry and I definitely over-order. But when my tray finally arrives and I take that first bite, I’m glad I waited. Seafood lovers: brave the line. Solo travelers: bring a book.
Later that afternoon, I head back to the fair for Tito Bolivar’s mural tour. I’ve read that the murals of San Nicolas are a gift from the artists who participate in the fair. Whether or not that’s technically true, there’s clearly a strong link between each year’s fair and new murals going up. Bolivar is the reason Aruba has commercial galleries at all and why Forbes named San Nicolas the street-art capital of the Caribbean. So I’m shocked to learn that he wasn’t always an art guy. He fell in love with street art, and art more broadly, in Bogotá, Colombia, in 2015—and produced the first edition of Aruba Art Fair just a year later after connecting with local artists, international artists, art influencers and culture activists.
“I wanted to do something meaningful, so we started a mural and gallery movement in San Nicolas,” he says as we stroll from one wall to the next. “And because this is the island’s heart, we brought it back to life. We don’t just do the fair—we run social projects, too.” He’s facilitated art programs in the prison and started programs in schools focused on web design, videography, music production, dance and fashion. He hosts solo shows in his galleries; in December, he’ll be bringing work by artists from his roster to Red Dot Miami.
(Note: You can check out the murals just by walking around, but the tour is absolutely worth taking if you’re staying in Oranjestad or further north—not just for the depth of Bolivar’s knowledge but for his energetic delivery.)
I spend a few more hours at the fair, wandering from booth to booth, chatting with artists. Inside the galleries are throngs of people. Outside are throngs of partiers. An artist/illustrator whose name and Instagram handle I’ve since lost turns me into a cartoon (on the off chance you’re reading this, email me!). I sit at a long table and paint a luchador on a bottle with painter and singer Angela Croes, who serenades us as we struggle to find the spirits lurking in our recycled canvases. One throughline of my time here is how inclusive everything—art and otherwise—feels. I’m traveling alone, but everywhere I go, there’s good, earnest conversation and shared appreciation for everything Aruba has to offer.
On the drive back to Bucuti & Tara for my final evening, I take a wrong turn and find myself somewhere unexpected—an upscale shopping strip. There’s a Louis Vuitton store. Then Gucci, Dolce & Gabbana and Prada. I park and wander. Aruba is extremely safe, and I’m curious to see a little more of it in my final hours here. There are the pastel-hued Dutch colonial buildings that look like fancy tea cakes that I’ve only seen in photos. Streetcar tracks that, I learn later, are for the double-decker trolleys that shuttle cruise passengers through the capital. There are Osaira Muyale’s famous blue horses—public sculptures commemorating the island’s horse trade. And of course, restaurants, casinos and nightclubs. This is Oranjestad, Aruba’s capital city and where the cruising class makes landfall. It’s charming, sure, but give me gritty San Nicolas and a chop suey pastechi over a trip to Cartier any day.
Flash forward to the next morning. It’s Monday. My bizcation is officially over, and I wake up—yet again—stupidly early to work and then sip coffee on my balcony for much longer than I should, watching the sun come up over the palms and listening to the birds. I know I need to check out, head to the airport and get a few more stories filed. But I don’t want to go.
All during my trip, people kept talking about Aruba’s repeat visitors. “You’ll be back,” they’d say, and I didn’t understand—until now. I make my way down to the beach one final time to sit and stare at the turquoise waves. There’s that gentle breeze again. And I find I can’t bring myself to stand up and turn my back on the beach.
I still say I’m not a sit-on-the-beach person. Unless, apparently, I’m in Aruba.
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