Nation Builder
Matthew Monahan
2010
Cast bronze (ed. 1 of 3)
Donated by the Bloom Family in 2023
Where is it located in the garden?
Riparian Garden
More about
Matthew Monahan
“Merges myth, modernist abstraction, alchemical material process to critique classical monumentality”
WHY NATION BUILDER MATTERS
• Reimagines public statuary: It subverts notions of authority and triumph prevalent in traditional war monuments, transforming them into uneasy, precarious figures.
• Bridges ancient and contemporary: The sculpture is as much about visual myth and history as it is about its material transformation—invoking ancient relics while feeling unmistakably modern.
• Physical presence: At nearly 9 feet tall, its scale gives it heroic weight, while the visible seams and textures betray fragility and process.
EXHIBITION & CONTEXT
• Created for “Statuesque”, a summer 2010 outdoor exhibition by the Public Art Fund in City Hall Park, New York. It marked both Monahan’s New York debut and the first show curated by Nicholas Baume at the Fund
• The exhibition featured ten contemporary figurative sculptures, calling into question traditional triumphal bronze monuments with more fragmented, humanizing approaches.
ARTIST SIGNIFICANCE
• Described as a futuristic knight, the statue depicts a missing-leg figure bearing a large weapon, standing on two disjointed cuboid pedestals — evoking both mythic and speculative architecture.
• Monahan’s work often combines the aesthetics of antiquity with modern materials and processes—here, bronze with raw, industrial construction-like pedestals, emphasizing tension between figure and base.
• His broader artistic practice involves merging drawing-based processes, foam, wax, drywall, glass—and then casting the result in bronze to evoke transformation, fragility, and alchemy. He likens bronze to a second skin, layered over wax molds, shaped by studio labor and foundry violence.
• The work challenges classical representation by inserting fragmentation, artificial patina, and imperfection—highlighting mortality and the tension between monumentality and decay.
EXHIBITIONS AND RECOGNITION
Monahan has exhibited extensively in major galleries and museums worldwide. His solo exhibitions include venues such as the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, Anton Kern Gallery in New York, and Galerie Fons Welters in Amsterdam. His work has also been featured in group exhibitions at institutions like the Royal Academy and the Saatchi Gallery in London, and Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in the Netherlands.
In 2023, the Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas acquired six of Monahan's sculptures, showcasing his continued relevance in the contemporary art scene.
“Nation Builder” a figurative statue by California artist Matthew Monahan, stands in front of the Sawtooth Botanical Garden visitor center. The bronze statue, assembled by hand, resembles a soldier carrying what could be construed as a bazooka built out of remnants that gives it the feel of a futuristic movie like “Mad Max.” The weapon is way bigger than the man’s head and the hands are huge, too.
- Eye on Sun Valley, 5/23
PUBLIC COLLECTIONS
Aïshti Foundation, Beirut, Lebanon
AkzoNobel Art Foundation Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, TX
Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam, Netherlands
Carnegie Museum of Art De Ateliers, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Fries Museum, Leeuwarden, Netherlands
Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA
Los Angeles MoCA, Los Angeles, CA
Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, TX
Rubell Family Collection, Miami, FL
San Francisco MOMA, San Francisco, CA
Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands
TATE Modern, London, UK
The Bank of the Netherlands, Amsterdam, Netherlands
The Saatchi Collection, London, UK
Centraal Museum Utrecht, Netherlands
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
The Ullens Collection, Beijing, China
Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN