Lauded for her brilliant use of color, Inka Essenhigh creates otherworldly landscape paintings riddled with sprites and supernatural archetypes. While many of her earlier works contain references to graphic novels and animation, some of her latest pieces, such as Purple Pods (ca. 2019) and Orange Fall (2020), draw on botanical themes to create oneiric compositions that blur the boundaries between figuration and abstraction.
Essenhigh is, at times, associated with contemporary figurative painting. Yet her ethereal imagery is ultimately nonobjective, a genuine product of her imagination. Referencing this quality of her work, she has said, “The unknown comes from the painting process, putting brush to canvas. I do have an agenda and a world I want to create. I’m not interested in meaninglessness. But I am looking for the feeling that the images are coming to me.”
