Lal Demir is a Turkish abstract artist based in Amsterdam. Her practice explores emotion, memory, intimacy and transformation through layered acrylic surfaces, texture, gestural mark-making and calligraphic forms.

ARTIST STATEMENT

Demir’s practice centers on memory, intimacy, emotional vulnerability and transformation. Working mainly with acrylic, she builds layered surfaces through texture, gesture and calligraphic marks. Her paintings often develop through a process of adding, covering and revealing, allowing earlier traces to remain visible beneath the surface.

Her work frequently moves between contrasting emotional states such as closeness and distance, desire and pain, fragility and strength. Rather than illustrating these ideas directly, she uses color, texture and movement to create surfaces that hold several emotions at once.

In her recent body of work, Demir has also drawn on classical Turkish poetry and its symbolic language. These references have become a way of approaching themes such as longing, loss, desire, suffering and transformation within her abstract practice.

EXHIBITIOns

2026 — L’âl, Solo Exhibition, Anafartalar Çarşısı, Ankara
1–30 September 2026

2026 — Group Exhibition, M Space, Montmartre, Paris
3–7 July 2026

2026 — Cities and People, Group Exhibition, NDSM Fuse, Amsterdam
14 February–30 March 2026