Kelly Akashi Work in Headlands Art Center Benefit Auction 2026

4 June 2026

On 4 June, Kelly Akashi's work Undergrowth (Headlands), 2026 is featured in the Headlands Art Center Benefit Auction 2026.

Kelly Akashi's (Headlands Artist in Residence ‘19) visual language emphasizes the impermanence of the natural world, recording and indexing fragmented moments in time. Towering sculpted weeds, delicately glassblown flowers, a to-scale depiction of her body in polished travertine, enlarged casts of extinct species of shells: Akashi poetically and objectively encapsulates the notion of mortality in a ritualistic gathering of objects. Her take on her own practice is not a morbid one; Akashi references the phrase mono no aware: “It refers to a wistful awareness of impermanence—the 'pathos of things.' It’s central to hanami, the Japanese custom of venturing out to enjoy the brief season of cherry blossoms.”

Akashi was commissioned to create a monumental sculpture for John F. Kennedy International Airport’s New Terminal One, opening this year, and was selected for the Hyundai Terrace Commission: Kelly Akashi for the Whitney Biennial 2026. Akashi has had recent solo exhibitions at Lisson Gallery, Los Angeles; Fondazione Furla Galleria d’Arte Moderna, Milan, Italy; and the Henry Art Gallery, Seattle, WA. Her 10-year survey, Formations, began at the San José Museum of Art in 2022 and traveled to the Frye Art Museum, Seattle, and the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego. Akashi’s work can be found in the permanent collections of the Brooklyn Museum of Art, NY; Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Sifang Museum, Nanjing, China; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN; and X Museum, Beijing, China, among others.

Find out more via Headlands Art Center.

Image: Kelly Akashi, Undergrowth (Headlands), 2026, Bronze, lost-wax cast and direct burn-out cast, wire brushed, 24 × 14 × 14.5 in, Courtesy of the artist and Lisson Gallery