Inga Kaupelytė

Inga Kaupelyte produces drawings and paintings in expressionism style.

Her work is a reflection on our complex society and the universal questions of mortality and reincarnation. Her question is about our behaviour as we gonna live forever, bodily and material desires versus spiritual existences, and the unity of oneness. She uses ashes of various burned materials as the form of medium depicting the message that we all come from nowhere and we will become nothing one day, and probably later we will reborn. “Ashes to ashes” - based on the Bible but incorporating ideas from Buddhism. Inga burns objects, leaves, paper, textile, then uses them in composing new shapes, referring this process as reincarnation. She signs her art under Ingaga name, which means being “very enthusiastic and excited about someone or something”. This is exactly how she feels after completing an artwork.

One of Inga’s trademarks is unamused face/-es she uses in the characters in her paintings. A human face is depicted rarely, as she prefers to use a metaphor of an animal. That face is unhappy, seeking for a better life, even though not realizing it is living wonderful times. This way Inga wants to remind us to be grateful of what we have and to remember that one day we’ll die.

Inga Kaupelyte was born in Panevezys, Lithuania in 1983. She lives and works in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Inga Kaupelyte has shown her work in group exhibitions around Europe.

“You will always exist in the universe in one form or another.”

— Shunryu Suzuki

When Inga was a child she thought she would become a poet. Inga loved to create with words. But after numerous paintings of pegasus horses and winning few drawing contests at schools her parents suggested she should better create "visual poems".

When Inga was just 12 she started attending Painting school in her hometown Panevezys.

After graduating simultaneously from High School and the School of Fine Arts, she successfully achieved a bachelor degree in Audiovisual Arts at Vilnius Academy of Fine Arts in Lithuania.

Later on Inga worked as an Art Director, Video Editor and Digital Designer in advertising and TV industry for several years. Then she moved abroad in search of inspiration amongst new surroundings. Since then Inga worked in Ireland, Belgium, Sweden and Spain; when eventually she moved to Amsterdam where she currently lives.

Since 2013 Inga is also a founder of design label Ingaga Porcelain, of which she is also a designer and a maker.