This week’s studio feature is Inka Essenhigh, an American painter currently based in New York. The artist is known for surrealist paintings that blend rich, voluminous abstraction with pop-art-esque suggestions of figures. 

I like the way that Essenhigh’s studio mimics a gallery space -- the white walls jut into the space, holding one painting each, the works hung with geometric expertise. I wonder if these paintings are finished, or if the artist is placing the final touches on them. Either way, this setup seems like a clever way to get a feel for how finished works are going to look when on display. 

Though it’s shaped something like a gallery, the space still has the trappings of an artist’s studio space, complete with open paint cans and various materials strewn throughout, and paint splatter all over the floors and some of the walls. The artist has a contemplative look about her in this photo -- perhaps she’s posing for the camera, but it looks like she’s gazing at a painting, thinking about her next move. 

Essenhigh currently has gallery representation in New York, Chicago, London, and Aspen. The artist studied at the School of Visual Arts in New York, where she earned a Master of Fine Arts in 1994.

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