MoNA Portsmouth: New Museum Merges Contemporary Art with Jazz Club

The Museum of New Art (MoNA) has opened in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on the first floor of 135 Congress Street, sharing a building with Jimmy's, a historic jazz club known for its high-quality artists and cuisine. The museum is led by executive director and curator Brett Knappe, who recently moved from Seattle, and board president Suzanne Bresette, who previously ran an exhibition space on Bow Street that closed after five shows due to luxury condo development. MoNA will operate as a non-collecting institution, focusing on temporary exhibitions, workshops, and community engagement to foster dialogue on social, political, and cultural issues through contemporary art. Its inaugural exhibition features German-born painter and sculptor Markus Linnenbrink (born 1961 in Dortmund), whose work has been shown in galleries from New York to San Francisco and in European cities including Madrid, Berlin, and Vienna. Linnenbrink, now based in New York, is presenting his first show in New Hampshire. His pieces, inspired by the stripe paintings of Morris Louis and Gene Davis, use a 'falling drop' technique to create monumental, saturated works that suggest spontaneity and intuitive process, with occasional subtle interruptions. Knappe stated that the stripes 'bring the public closer to the fantastic world of the sublime.'