Happy Brideday is Deniz Ozuygur’s first solo exhibition, merging a child’s birthday and a wedding into something uncanny. Every work is constructed from hundreds of thousands of fuse beads—her children’s toy—spelling out their candid, unsettling questions and forming sculptural pieces like a cake, banner, tiara, and presents. The beads lend the show a playful, pastel aesthetic, yet the subject matter is heavy, delivered with humor and lightness. Balancing critique and irony, the exhibition reveals how rituals of girlhood foreshadow expectations of womanhood, care, and sacrifice—lightly suggesting the uneasy ways childhood and marriage can be entwined. Presented as a parallel exhibition to the Istanbul Biennial, it remains on view at Büyükdere35 Gallery until October 18.

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