Mona Kuhn

Dream-like and ethereal, Mona Kuhn’s artwork synthesizes portraiture, landscape, and abstract imagery to contemplate the human body in its most natural state. The artist is known for her portrayals of the human figure, creating images that exude warmth, comfort, and beauty. The subjects’ settings mirror or complement their organic postures outdoors, whether they are sun-drenched in the southern California desert, lush French landscapes, or indoors. 

Kuhn’s creative process begins with a color palette and emotion, before the artist identifies a location and finally her subjects. Her 2006 series Evidence, amongst the first bodies of work to earn the artist acclaim, is comprised of alluring figurative studies set in a French naturist colony. Inspired by the cheerful, verdant outdoors and the sense of freedom and respect she observed in the colony, Kuhn uses abstracted form to distill the essence of this environment and mindset. In Native (2009), the artist returns to her home country of Brazil, a journey that began as a personal exploration and evolved into an examination of the natural environment and the nature of intimacy itself.

Kuhn is known to establish emotional connections with her subjects, which instills the honest confidence displayed in each portrait. Kuhn’s close bonds with her subjects’ places them in the role of collaborator. These bodies of work visually manifest mutual trust and frame vulnerability as empowerment. In the series She Disappeared into Complete Silence (2014), Kuhn photographs her close friend and collaborator Jacintha in Joshua Tree National Park, California. Kuhn captures Jacintha indulging in the light and warmth of the desertscape as well as inside architect Robert Stone’s secluded golden palace, where sunrays stream through large windows and reflect on mirrors that blur the boundary between indoors and out. Kuhn’s dynamic use of reflections, light leaks, and shadows allow her to render her subjects and environment holistically, exploring both the realistic and abstract elements that compose them.