The artist Dirk Stewen lives and works in Hamburg. His interdisciplinary work is rooted in photography and is experimenting in juxtapositions and installations with the predecessors of the medium: drawing and painting. The combination of formal rigour and poetic experimentation is typical for his work. He employs images, texts, spacing, and size in his exhibitionsto stimulate the disruption of thought patterns and hierarchies through sensitivity and openness.

His work has been shown in numerous international exhibitions, including the CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Art in San Francisco, the Aspen Art Museum, Colorado, Kunsthaus Bregenz, the Ladengalerie in Linz, and Arnolfini, Bristol. In Germany, his work has been exhibited at the Bundeskunsthalle, Bonn, the Von Heyd Museum, Wuppertal, the Künstlerhaus Stuttgart, and the Kunstverein in Hamburg, among others.

He is represented by international galleries. His recent exhibitions include Daphne, Gerhardsen Gerner, Oslo (2021) and Transition, Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York (2018), with whom he has collaborated since 2006. He was a fellow at Villa Aurora, Los Angeles (2013) and artist in residence at the Chinati Foundation, Marfa, Texas (2012-2013). In 2016/2017 he was a visiting teacher at De Ateliers, Amsterdam. A monograph titled While You Were Out, which shows a broad spectrum of Stewen’s work, was published by Walther König in 2009.

Dirk Stewen was a resident at Tarabya Cultural Academy from February to May 2022 and in September 2022.