Spotlight: Kelly Akashi
MAY 27-JUNE 26, 2026
The Spotlight series includes a new or never-before-exhibited artwork paired with a commissioned piece of writing, creating focused and thoughtful conversations between the visual arts and authors, critics, poets, scholars, and beyond. In this iteration, the Spotlight features Kelly Akashi’s To be titled, 2026. A text by Franklin Melendez accompanies the presentation.
About:
Kelly Akashi (b. 1983, Los Angeles, CA) received a BFA from Otis College of Art & Design in 2006 and an MFA from the University of Southern California in 2014. She also studied at the prestigious Staatliche Hochschule für Bildende Künste (Städelschule) in Frankfurt am Main, Germany in 2010. Akashi has been commissioned to create a monumental sculpture for John F. Kennedy International Airport’s New Terminal One (NTO), opening in 2026. She was also awarded the Hyundai Terrace Commission for the 2026 Whitney Biennial. In 2025, Akashi was chosen as an Artist-in-Residence at Pilchuck Glass School. Recent solo exhibitions include Heirloom at Lisson Gallery in New York, USA (12 May - 25 July, 2026), Kelly Akashi at Lisson Gallery in Los Angeles, USA (20 February - 29 March 2025), Kelly Akashi – Converging Figures Fondazione Furla Galleria d’Arte Moderna, Milan, Italy (13 September – 8 December 2024) and Kelly Akashi: Encounters at the Henry Art Gallery, Seattle, USA (30 September 2023 – 15 June 2024) and her 10-year survey, Formations, which began at the San José Museum of Art in 2022, travelled to the Frye Art Museum in Seattle and then to the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, through 2024. Recent group exhibitions include Roppongi Crossing 2025: What Passes Is Time. We Are Eternal., Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan (3 December 2025 - 29 March 2026), A Garden of Promise and Dissent, Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, Ridgefield, USA (17 November 2024 – November 2025); Spirit House, Cantor Arts Center, Stanford, USA (4 September 2024 – 26 January 2025); Ecstatic: Selections from the Hammer Contemporary Collection, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, USA (2023); Ground/work at Clark Institute, Williamstown, USA (2020); Possessed, MO.CO Panacée, Montpellier, France; Take Me (I’m Yours), The Jewish Museum, New York, USA (2016); and Made in LA: a, the, though, only, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, USA (2016). Akashi’s work can be found in the permanent collections of the Brooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn, NY, USA; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA, USA; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA, USA; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA, USA; Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego, CA, USA; Sifang Museum, Nanjing, China, The Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN, USA; and X Museum, Beijing, China, among others.
Franklin Melendez is a writer, independent curator, and art advisor. He has been a regular contributor to numerous art publications, among them Artforum, Frieze, Flash Art, and Kaleidoscope, where he also served as Arts Editor. He has also contributed to artist monographs and institutional publications, including for the 2022 exhibition Heroic Bodies at Rudolph Tegner Museum, Denmark. In 2017, Melendez co-founded the New York-based art advisory and curatorial firm, DM Office, along with Romain Dauriac. DM Office has organized exhibitions throughout the US, Latin America, Asia, and Europe, most recently Hudinilson Jr. Selected Works: 1978-2000 at 15 Orient, New York. Forthcoming projects include exhibitions in Shanghai and Taipei. Melendez splits his time between New York and California.