b. 1981, New York, NY
Lives and works in Sicily, IT
Lola Montes is a New York-born and Sicily-based multidisciplinary artist whose work spans painting, ceramic sculpture, filmmaking, sound design, and textiles. Materials and materiality are critical features of the artist’s practice, which has recently focused on painted ceramics. Montes works in a foundry to create her own tiles, and prefers to work outdoors, where the natural world’s incursions and inspirations can inform her work. Invested in harnessing the creative power of natural materials, Montes is also drawn to the element of improvisation and chance while sculpting ceramics. She describes the firing process as alchemical: it is esoteric and transformative, meaning that her materials undergo the very transmutations that the angels who appear across her works do. As Montes has stated, “The tiles have a physicality, a body that as an object is unique.”
Lola Montes (b. 1981, New York, NY; lives and works in Sicily, IT) received a BFA from The Cooper Union School in 2008. She has exhibited at Muse Gallery, Samedan, CH; Goodroom, Munich, DE; Mana Contemporary, Jersey City, NJ, US; Zuecca Projects, Venice, IT; Ileana Tounta Contemporary Art Center, Athens, Greece; and the Ludwig Museum, Koblenz, DE; among many others. In addition to her painting and sculpture practice, Montes is a filmmaker, editor, and sound designer.