Whitney Biennial 2026 and Hyundai Terrace Commission: Kelly Akashi
4 minute read
June 26, 2026
A Shared Vision for Contemporary Art Driven by Hyundai Motor and the Whitney Museum
In March 2026, Whitney Biennial 2026 and Hyundai Terrace Commission: Kelly Akashi opened at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. Together, they reflect Hyundai Motor Company’s long-term commitment to supporting artistic experimentation and opening up discussions for audiences worldwide.
A Long-Term Partnership
In 2024, Hyundai Motor and the Whitney
Museum announced a 10-year partnership
that enables artists to test their aspirations
and expand their practice. This is one of the
longest and most expansive global corporate
partnerships to date for the museum.
Founded in 1930, the Whitney Museum has long championed emerging voices in contemporary art and introduced them to wider audiences. This partnership builds on that legacy, presenting the most relevant art and ideas of our time and sparking dialogue with audiences worldwide.
As presenting partner, Hyundai Motor
supports both the Hyundai Terrace
Commission—an annual, site-specific
installation on the museum’s fifth-floor
terrace—and the Whitney Biennial. In Biennial
years, the Hyundai Terrace Commission
becomes part of the broader Biennial
exhibition, extending its reach and
resonance.
Whitney Museum of American Art. Photo: Timothy Schenck
Installation View, Whitney Biennial 2026. Photo: Steven Probert Studio
The Whitney Biennial: A Landmark Platform for Contemporary American Art
This is the museum’s landmark exhibition, showcasing contemporary
artists across media and disciplines, and reflecting evolving perspectives
on American art.
First established in 1932 by founder Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, the
Whitney Biennial is the longest-running survey of American art, bringing
together leading and emerging artists every two years to reflect on the
issues shaping our time.
The earliest Biennials began as annual exhibitions in the 1930s, before
evolving into the current Biennial format. While its form has changed over
time, its purpose remains the same as when it began: to shine a light on
the most compelling artists of each moment.
More than 3,600 artists have participated to date, making the Biennial the
most groundbreaking presentation of the leading contemporary American
art.
Whitney Biennial 2026
The Whitney Biennial has long served as a platform for ideas that may feel
challenging or ahead of their time, creating space for dialogue that often
extends well beyond the exhibition itself.
This year’s Whitney Biennial 2026 marks the second edition since the 10
year partnership between Hyundai Motor and the Whitney Museum was
established in 2024.
This 82nd edition brings together 56 artists, duos and collectives
responding to a world in transition.
The works explore how we relate to one another and to the systems
around us, from family and community to environment and technology, as
well as the infrastructures that shape everyday life.
Rather than offering clear answers, the exhibition focuses on atmosphere
and experience. Visitors are invited into spaces that feel at times tense,
intimate, unexpected, and even humorous, opening up new ways of
imagining how we live together.
Hyundai Terrace Commission
The newly imagined outdoor exhibition project, the Hyundai Terrace
Commission, offers an innovative platform for artists to experiment at
scale and to engage the museum’s fifth-floor terrace as an interface
between art, architecture, the built environment, and the surrounding city.
Conceived by Renzo Piano, the architect behind the Whitney building in
New York City’s Meatpacking District, and originally known as the ‘Test
Platform’, the museum’s largest outdoor gallery is a flexible and dynamic
space for large-scale and monumental installations. In doing so, it
supports ambitious, site-specific works that might not otherwise be
possible.
From 2024 to 2026: Hyundai Terrace Commission
Following the first two Hyundai Terrace Commissions, this third edition by Kelly
Akashi opened in March as part of the Whitney Biennial 2026.
The 2024 Hyundai Terrace Commission: Torkwase Dyson: Liquid Shadows, Solid
Dreams (A Monastic Playground), invited visitors into a tactile, immersive
environment shaped by monumental geometries of light and space, reflecting the
artist’s conviction: “freedom is an ongoing spatial question of motion and
imagination.”
The 2025 Hyundai Terrace Commission: Marina Zurkow: The River is a Circle,
explored the complexities of ecosystems around the Hudson River in an evolving
animation and accompanying installation, responding to real-time weather and
reflecting on the layered histories and possible futures of the Meatpacking District.
Hyundai Terrace Commission: Kelly Akashi, 2026.
Photo: Steven Probert Studio
The act of rebuilding is not simply about material endurance; it is
a deliberate labor of care, an engagement with history, and an act of reclamation.
– Artist Kelly Akashi.
The Artist: Kelly Akashi
Kelly Akashi (b. 1983, Los Angeles), the artist of this year’s Hyundai
Terrace Commission, is a sculptor whose work explores impermanence,
time, and the traces we leave behind.
Working across glass, bronze, stone, and cast materials, she often
returns to the hand as a central motif. Her sculptures—from delicate
glass flowers to towering weeds and cast hands, bodies, and extinct
shells—reflect on temporality with a quiet, grounded sensitivity.
Hyundai Terrace Commission: Kelly Akashi, 2026. Photo: Timothy Schenck.
Hyundai Terrace Commission: Kelly Akashi, 2026. Photo: Steven Probert Studio.
The Works on View
In this exhibition, Kelly Akashi presents a new sculptural installation, a steel relief, works on
paper, and an outdoor-screen animation across the Whitney’s fifth-floor terrace and adjacent
spaces. These works are shaped in part by her experience in the aftermath of the Eaton Fire in
January 2025.
Anchoring the presentation is Monument (Altadena) (2026), a chimney and pathway installation
that takes shape as both reconstruction and memorial. After Akashi’s home and studio burned in
the fire, the chimney was the only structure left standing. For the Hyundai Terrace Commission,
the artist has worked with a mason to rebuild it piece by piece, alongside a reconstruction of her
home’s pathway in cast glass brick. Installed on the terrace, the work transforms the Whitney
Museum’s outdoor gallery into a site of witness and reflection on survival, rupture, and what
remains.
Also on the terrace, Inheritance (Distressed) (2026) is installed on the bulkhead south of Monument (Altadena). The work draws from a personal archive, Akashi’s grandmother’s doilies,
which the artist rescued from a family garage sale and later lost in the same fire.
Inside the museum, Imprints (2026) comprises five framed works on paper. On the terrace’s outdoor screen, Remnants (Constellations) (2026) extends the presentation into moving image.
Hyundai Terrace Commission: Kelly Akashi, 2026.
Photo: Steven Probert Studio.
[Kelly Akashi] produced a monumental work
that stands as a resolute testament to remembrance and the legacies
that shape our collective and individual histories.
– Marcela Guerrero, DeMartini Family Curator at the Whitney Museum of American Art.
Plan Your Visit!
Whitney Biennial 2026 and Hyundai Terrace Commission: Kelly Akashi are on view at the Whitney Museum through August 23, 2026. If you find yourself in New York, it’s well worth experiencing the exhibition in person. Given the rich program of events, talks, and performances, visitors may find it helpful to check Whitney Museum’s online calendar in advance, and tickets can also be booked online on the Whitney Museum website.
Installation View, Whitney Biennial 2026. Photo: Steven Probert Studio
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Whitney Biennial 2026 is co-organized by Whitney Museum curators
Marcela Guerrero, DeMartini Family Curator, and Drew Sawyer,
Sondra Gilman Curator of Photography, with Beatriz Cifuentes,
Biennial Curatorial Assistant, and Carina Martinez, Rubio Butterfield
Family Fellow