In the 1970s, Dogançay started traveling for his "Walls of the World" photographic documentary project. He met his future wife, Angela, at the Hungarian Ball at the Hotel Pierre in New York. In 2006, a painting by Dogancay titled "Trojan Horse" was gifted by the Turkish government to the OECD in Paris. Dogançay lived and worked during the last eight years of his life alternating between his studios in New York and Turgutreis, Turkey. He died at the age of 83 in January 2013.