artist statement
Montserrat Duran Muntadas is a multidisciplinary artist whose work engages with fundamental aspects of life that are often treated as taboo or sensitive. She examines themes such as motherhood, infertility, death, and mourning through diverse cultural and political perspectives. Recurring motifs in her practice include explorations of emotion and complex family relationships, a strong commitment to gender equality, and a critical stance toward patriarchy. Her personal experiences are interwoven with broader, universal narratives.
She expresses these ideas primarily through sculpture and installation, with glass as her principal medium. Working across ancient techniques such as blowing, casting, and flameworking, she frequently combines glass with materials like embroidered textiles or furniture, creating paradoxical yet seamless unions. These hybrid works often draw inspiration from the female body and organic forms found in nature. Their morphology and material combinations resonate with such intensity that they evoke profound and immediate sensory responses.
artist biography
Montserrat Duran Muntadas is a Catalan born artist living in Montreal, Canada. In 2007, she graduated with honours from the Centro Nacional del Vidrio, at the Real Fabrica de Cristales de La Granja, in Spain. This is where she was exposed to and taught many glass art techniques while specializing in blown glass and flameworked glass. In 2010, she received a Bachelor in Visual Arts from the University of Barcelona in Spain, which permitted her to delve into conceptual art. Following her arrival to Canada in 2012, she was able to merge her acquired knowledge with two of her greatest passions for conceptual art and glass, as well as dedicate herself to creating sculptures and installations.
Over the years, she has participated in more than 50 national and international group exhibitions including: SOFA Chicago, the European Glass Context in Denmark, and the European Glass Festival in Poland. Also, she was finalist and laureate of several awards such as: the 2017 Canadian Clay and Glass Gallery Award for Glass, 2017 Prix Jean-Cartier de la Relève, and the 2019 Prix François-Houdé as well as receiving many grants from the Conseil des Arts et Lettres du Québec, Bourse ForCGal and the Canada Council for the Arts.
In 2019, she created her first public artwork for an elementary school in Montreal. In 2020, she produced a new public artwork for the Armand-Frappier Museum in Laval. In 2016, she completed a glassblowing residency at the North Lands Creative Glass, in Scotland and in 2021, an artist residency at the prestigious Pilchuck Glass School in Stanwood, WA, USA. In 2015, she had her first solo exhibition at the Galerie Espace VERRE in Montreal, Canada. Since then, she has had 12 solo exhibitions.
Her work has been published in many glass art magazines such as: Glass Quarterly, Neues Glas, New Glass Review, La Revue de la Ceramique et du verre as well as in art and fine crafts magazines such as: All She Makes, STUDIO, Craft & Design in Canada, ESSE and Vie des arts. In 2021 curator and independent author Pascale Beaudet wrote the first bilingual monograph dedicated to his career as an artist. Furthermore, her works are part of many collections, including the City of Montreal, the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec and the Musée des métiers art du Quebec in Canada and the Museo de Arte en Vidrio de Alcorcón, Spain.
She is currently a teacher at the glass school Espace Verre in Montreal.
