Light Between the Islands background by Grimanesa Amoros
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ONSITE KATONAH

Grimanesa Amorós ONSITE KATONAH, site-specific LED sculpture and light sculpture created for the Edward Larrabee Barnes-designed campus of the Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, New York, 2016. Exhibited in OnSite Katonah, a group exhibition in which artists reimagined every facet of the KMA's distinctive architectural campus through immersive light and material installations.
Grimanesa Amorós ONSITE KATONAH, site-specific LED sculpture and light sculpture created for the Edward Larrabee Barnes-designed campus of the Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, New York, 2016. Exhibited in OnSite Katonah, a group exhibition in which artists reimagined every facet of the KMA's distinctive architectural campus through immersive light and material installations.
Grimanesa Amorós ONSITE KATONAH, site-specific LED sculpture and light sculpture created for the Edward Larrabee Barnes-designed campus of the Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, New York, 2016. Exhibited in OnSite Katonah, a group exhibition in which artists reimagined every facet of the KMA's distinctive architectural campus through immersive light and material installations.
Grimanesa Amorós ONSITE KATONAH, site-specific LED sculpture and light sculpture created for the Edward Larrabee Barnes-designed campus of the Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, New York, 2016. Exhibited in OnSite Katonah, a group exhibition in which artists reimagined every facet of the KMA's distinctive architectural campus through immersive light and material installations.
Grimanesa Amorós ONSITE KATONAH, site-specific LED sculpture and light sculpture created for the Edward Larrabee Barnes-designed campus of the Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, New York, 2016. Exhibited in OnSite Katonah, a group exhibition in which artists reimagined every facet of the KMA's distinctive architectural campus through immersive light and material installations.
Grimanesa Amorós ONSITE KATONAH, site-specific LED sculpture and light sculpture created for the Edward Larrabee Barnes-designed campus of the Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, New York, 2016. Exhibited in OnSite Katonah, a group exhibition in which artists reimagined every facet of the KMA's distinctive architectural campus through immersive light and material installations.
Grimanesa Amorós ONSITE KATONAH, site-specific LED sculpture and light sculpture created for the Edward Larrabee Barnes-designed campus of the Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, New York, 2016. Exhibited in OnSite Katonah, a group exhibition in which artists reimagined every facet of the KMA's distinctive architectural campus through immersive light and material installations.
Grimanesa Amorós ONSITE KATONAH, site-specific LED sculpture and light sculpture created for the Edward Larrabee Barnes-designed campus of the Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, New York, 2016. Exhibited in OnSite Katonah, a group exhibition in which artists reimagined every facet of the KMA's distinctive architectural campus through immersive light and material installations.
Grimanesa Amorós ONSITE KATONAH, site-specific LED sculpture and light sculpture created for the Edward Larrabee Barnes-designed campus of the Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, New York, 2016. Exhibited in OnSite Katonah, a group exhibition in which artists reimagined every facet of the KMA's distinctive architectural campus through immersive light and material installations.
Grimanesa Amoros video thumbnail for ONSITE KATONAH

Location: Katonah Museum | Katonah, NY, 2016
34 ft x 34 ft x 11 ft 8 in (10.36 m x 10.36 m x 3.56 m)
LEDs, diffusion and reflective material, custom lighting sequence, electrical hardware, stainless steel and brass.

LIGHT BETWEEN THE ISLANDS is a 34-foot light installation occupying the Sally and Volney Righter Gallery at the Katonah Museum of Art, its constellation of pulsing lavender LED domes evoking the floating totora reed islands of Lake Titicaca in a darkened chamber that transforms the museum’s interior into an immersive landscape of ancestral memory and shifting light.

  • Presented as part of OnSite Katonah, a group exhibition of eight artists invited to create site-specific works responding to the museum’s distinctive architecture and landscape, artnet News (2016) recommended LIGHT BETWEEN THE ISLANDS as the defining reason to make the journey north of New York City to the Katonah Museum, describing Amorós’s pulsing lavender orbs as one of the summer’s most compelling art experiences in the region.
  • Amorós was given sole occupancy of a darkened gallery for the installation, with the bubble-like LED domes appearing to float weightlessly within the space as glowing islands, each form hand-constructed and silkscreened with imagery drawn from the totora reed landscapes of southeastern Peru.
  • The work translates the Uros people’s organic method of island-building, in which decomposing reed material is continuously replenished from above to keep the islands buoyant, into a contemporary visual language that positions light itself as the renewing force sustaining a living culture.
  • LIGHT BETWEEN THE ISLANDS ran from July 10 through October 2, 2016, alongside works by Amy Brener, MaDora Frey, Keiran Brennan Hinton, and Rachel Mica Weiss, situating Amorós within a broader institutional conversation about the relationship between site, material, and immersive experience in contemporary art.

    • Grimanesa Amorós’s practice is grounded in the dialogue between technological innovation and the natural world. While her light-based environments evoke elemental phenomena such as the aurora borealis, she recontextualizes these experiences through meticulously engineered installations that heighten perception and invite contemplation.

    For OnSite Katonah, Amorós presents a constellation of luminous sculptural forms that appear to float within the gallery. These works are inspired by the Uros Islands, which are artificial, floating landforms constructed by the Uros people on Lake Titicaca in her native Peru. Composed of interwoven layers of totora reeds, the islands are maintained through a cyclical process in which decomposing material is continually replenished from above. This allows the structures to remain buoyant over time. Amorós translates this organic methodology into a contemporary visual language, using shifting LED lights to evoke the ephemeral beauty and resilience of these living architectures. In doing so, she creates a powerful synthesis of ancestral knowledge and future-facing technology.

    OnSite Katonah features site-specific installations conceived in response to the Katonah Museum of Art’s landscape, architecture, and institutional context.