Ceyda Aykan

Young Turkish painter Ceyda Aykan was born in Istanbul, where she earned a BFA in painting before traveling to the United States on a Fulbright scholarship to receive her master’s degree at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. In her poetic, minimalistic canvases, Aykan pares down architectural forms and urban spaces to their essential forms, working in thinned oils and a muted palette to challenge the solidity of the forms she references. “These buildings come at us at disconcerting angles, or retreat out of reach,” writes critic Sarah Andress. “They are in motion, sometimes as though seen from multiple angles, often untethered from the ground.” Frequently working in repetitious series, Aykan has also dabbled in printmaking; while studying in Chicago, she worked as an assistant to Martin Creed.