Rey Akdogan creates subtle interventions into the spatial, temporal, and material conditions of a given environment through an understated use of repurposed industrial and display materials.
Recent works have employed—in a manner contrary to their intended use—materials from stage design, commercial photography, and industrial manufacturing: theatrical lighting gels, packing material, cinefoil, neutral density filters, PVC curtains, and fluorescent rods, among others. United by their literal and figurative capacity to filter, these materials are conventionally put toward utilitarian ends that seek to render them invisible through the act of use—they are seen through rather than looked at. However, in the case of Akdogan’s work, they simultaneously gesture toward the industrial context from which they came as well as the space in which they are exhibited.
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Rey Akdogan (b. 1974, Heilbronn, Germany) completed the Whitney Independent Study Program in 2004 after receiving an arts degree from Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, London in 2001. Recent solo exhibitions dedicated to her work have been held at Haus am Waldsee, Berlin (2026); Kunstverein Gartenhaus, Vienna (2026); Galerie Anke Schmidt, Cologne (2025, 2021); Miguel Abreu Gallery, New York (2023, 2017, 2015, 2012); Commercial Street, Los Angeles (2022); Hannah Hoffman, Los Angeles (2017, 2014); Radio Athènes, Athens (2016); and Andrew Roth Gallery, New York (2012).
In 2012, a solo exhibition of her work, off set, was held at MoMA PS1, Long Island City, New York. Akdogan was included in the 15th Baltic Triennial in 2024 and the XIV Bienal de Cuenca in 2018, as well as in major group exhibitions at Dia:Beacon, Greene Naftali, Real Fine Arts, Simone Subal Gallery, Elisabeth Ivers Gallery (all in New York); Galerie Eva Presenhuber (Zurich); Galerie Anke Schmidt (Cologne); Galerie Max Mayer (Düsseldorf); Rhona Hoffman Gallery (Chicago); FraenkelLAB (San Francisco); Galerie Balice Hertling (Paris); and Rodeo Gallery (Istanbul), among others. #46, a book of the artist’s work, was published by PPP Editions in 2012. Published by Minerva Projects, Akdogan’s Plant Light Curtain, a limited-edition artist book, was launched in the spring of 2023.
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