Commissioned with funds provided by patrons Nancy and Stephen Land, the Knoxville Museum of Art has added Karen LaMonte’s Nocturne I to its outdoor sculpture collection on the KMA grounds.
For the last 30 years since her graduation from the Rhode Island School of Design, LaMonte has been exploring the absence of the human body in revealing “the disparity between our natural skin and our social skin, clothing which we use to obscure and conceal, to protect the individual and project a persona.”
Relocating to the Czech Republic from her native New York City, LaMonte received a Fulbright Fellowship to explore the use of large-scale cast glass in her artwork, leading to Vestige, a cast glass sculpture of a dress. The work was the beginning of a body of work that has cemented her international reputation.
Unfortunately, cast glass cannot stand up to the elements; the KMA’s Nocturne I sculpture is made of cast iron, suitable for an outdoor sculpture garden. The KMA also owns a LaMonte cast-glass sculpture, Chado, donated by Washington D.C. collector Mary Corkran.
Nocturne I has been installed on the north side of the museum’s Clayton Building in the Land Family Sculpture Garden.
Above and Left: Karen LaMonte (New York 1967; lives and works in Prague, Czech Republic)—Nocturne 1, 2019. Cast iron, 2/3, 60 x 26.5 x 19 inches, Knoxville Museum of Art, 2019 purchase with funds provided by Nancy and Stephen Land
