12/05/2026
Akira Ikezoe’s attempts to remake the universe according to his own absurdist logic have earned him many admirers this spring, thanks to his simultaneous appearances in two prestigious New York shows—the Whitney Biennial and MoMA PS1’s Greater New York.
His work is often concerned with nonhumans, the transmission of energy, and faltering systems. In one painting, machine people harvest pearls from giant clamshells as robot workers nearby engage in the process of building solar panels; in another, an array of naked figures (and some skeletons) are roped into a dairy-centric system that happens to involve a pit of fire and a large mural.
“In typical Ikezoe fashion, everything is depicted with the sobriety of a diagram in an instruction manual,” Alex Greenberger writes, in a new profile of the artist. “It’s funny, bizarre, and more than a little terrifying.”
Read more about how Ikezoe reimagines the world: https://www.artnews.com/art-news/artists/akira-ikezoe-paintings-whitney-biennial-moma-ps1-1234784714/
