"Instinct" Painting

Romana Jelínková works across two seemingly contrasting modes, whose balance reflects an Eastern understanding of quiet strength. The first is dynamic and gestural. In her acrylic paintings, she works with vivid colour, intense combinations and, often, raw or structurally treated surfaces. Bold brushstrokes, drops and traces of paint become direct records of the movement embedded in the act of painting itself. Her works frequently capture fleeting moments, moods and emotions, translating them into an immediate visual gesture. The viewer can thus perceive not only the resulting composition, but also the movement that preceded it. The paintings acquire an almost performative quality, records of an instant that can never be repeated in quite the same way.

The second mode of her practice encompasses ceramic objects, layered oil paintings and monotypes. Here, her attention turns towards nature, its structures and details, as well as towards inner introspection. She draws from processes that unfold gradually — growth, layering, transformation and the passage of time. This is reflected in the nature of the work itself, where gesture slows down and becomes repetition, concentration and a process of discovery. A movement captured in a single instant is transformed into one that returns, accumulates and gradually shapes the final form.

These two approaches allow Jelínková to explore a broad spectrum of creative processes, while remaining connected by one central principle: a movement that could not have been otherwise. At times, it appears as a single, decisive gesture; at others, through repetition, layering and a gradual search for form. In both, there is an attentiveness to the present moment and an acceptance of its irreproducibility. It is here that her practice comes close to the principles of wabi-sabi, finding beauty in naturalness, transience, transformation and imperfection, not as a flaw, but as an inherent part of the process.