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OverviewEmre Özakat, born in 1997, Instabul, Turkey lives and works in Paris, France. Through his mixed-media practice, he investigates the anxieties of living in a world excessively politicized and media hyper-saturated with increasingly omnipresent surveillance, often as well questioning the credibility of the digital image in the 21st century through various methods of obscuring or manipulating digital images.
Özakat is drawn to imagery that feels off, scenes that are mundane yet uncanny, particularly those circulating in the forgotten corners of the internet. The photographs he sources, amateur snapshots of goats indoors, already possess a disorienting quality. There's something inherently surreal about livestock occupying domestic, human-made spaces. These unexpected juxtapositions disrupt conventional expectations, evoking absurdity, displacement, or a subtle sense of unease.
By digitally distorting and stretching these images before translating them into oil paintings, Özakat amplifies that discomfort. The manipulation serves as both a formal and conceptual gesture, heightening the 'wrongness' of the scenarios while also referencing the warping effects of digital culture, where meaning is continually bent, repeated, and remixed.
The act of painting these warped images by hand introduces yet another layer of mediation. It’s a slow, deliberate process that contrasts with the ephemeral, disposable nature of the original online photographs. Through this transformation, Özakat explores how absurd or overlooked digital content can acquire new significance and resonance when rendered materially, becoming strange relics salvaged from the detritus of internet culture.
Özakat graduated in 2020 from Gerrit Rietveld Academie with a BA in VAV/Moving Image. Since then he has participated numerous projects such as, fair and gallery shows with Enari Gallery, Springboard Art Fair 2023 in Utrecht, and [Dis]comfort Food, The Grey Space in the Middle, The Hague, 2022-2023. -
Works
Emre Özakat Turkish, b. 1997
Reproduction of a Horse II , 2023Oil on linen40 x 190 x 2 cm
15 3/4 x 74 3/4 x 3/4 inCopyright The ArtistFurther images
Exhibitions
Enari Gallery, group exhibition "Fabricated Love" 27/01/2024 - 09/03/20249of 9Biography
EDUCATION
2017-2020
Gerrit Rietveld Academie, VAV/Moving Image (Audiovisual Art)
2016-2017
Gerrit Rietveld Academie, Basic Year (Foundation)
EXHIBITIONS
2025
- CAN Ibiza (with Enari Gallery), Ibiza, Spain
- Scroll, Capture, Forget, Gallery van Fanny Freytag, Amsterdam
2024
- Lacunae, Josilda da Conceiçao Gallery, Amsterdam
- Fabricated Love, Enari Gallery, Amsterdam
2023
- Springboard Art Fair, Utrecht
- [Dis]comfort Food, The Grey Space in the Middle, The Hague, (2022-2023)
2022
- How to Set Your Signs on Fire, Fundraiser for Ukrainian art and artists, W139,
2021
- The New Current, Rotterdam
2019
- I Still Think I Can Be Yours, You Can Be Mine, Neverneverland, Amsterdam
GRANTS & AWARDS
2024
- Mondriaan Funds Artist Start grant
ExhibitionsArt fairsContact FormSend me more information on Emre Özakat
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