Inga Wilhelmy is fascinated by the simple, yet magical moments when paths cross.
Sonder is defined as the realization that the people around us are living lives just as vivid and complex as our own. She is interested in the multifaceted nature of a crowd. The individual uniqueness of each life, as well as the collective consciousness when taking a step back. Her work has taken on the idea of a crowd in many ways, using the crowd as a motif to describe her own life events as well as telling others stories. Inga visualizes this concept first through a photography and drawing process, then translate the studies to paint. Her finished work represents time shared in a common space that can never be reproduced even if we meet again. Because she has created the vivid histories, dreams, worries, and personalities of the figures in my work, she feel like she really knows the people as they become the characters in her storytelling. Painting offers a freedom to experiment with mark making, color, and surface quality which adds depth to each individual character’s complexity.