Boy and his friends Print

Artist statement: Painting is a dialogue in silence. It’s a way of communicating with people, with help of which I can get to know things in them that cannot be expressed with words. People are a reflection of a world they created in themselves and in which they live. That world is the object of my paintings. We create that inner space, inhabit it, but it shapes us as well. Living in that invisible place affects and changes a preson. By painting the faces and bodies of people their word becomes visible. That is why I have taken an interest in human body, and the things it says about the person who inhabits it. When I start working, I don’t think rationally right away about the idea. I let the motif itself lead and mesmerize me, and allow that impulse to do wathever it pleases on the paiting. That initiall giving over is a path to sincerity towards ones true nature. Instead of setting myself a clear goal, I let my painting instinct drag me where it wants to go. After that I rationally perceive what is going on in the world of the painting. I think about why a certain motif or a formal element drew me towards it, why was it important to me, and what was behind that painter’s excitement. At that moment I am almost just an ordinary observer. Than I get back in the painting and with newly acquired knowledge I move on. That way the painting together with the idea and the concept develops- one with the help of the other. When I’m working in that manner, I don’t have to try imagine a new idea by force, it happens by itself. The craft of creation is giving into what is already there, inside oneself, and exploring that part. The actual content of paintings are faces and bodies of people. The compositions are minimalistic, intimate, the face alone looking at an observer, or a lonley body in empty space. This sort of tucked in atmosphere has a task to invite the audience for a private dialogue. The idea is that the people focus on the person itself who is painted and step into their world. The presence of people while I paint is important, but not because of formal reasons (color, form or something else). What matters is the presence of a person I have to read and interpret and express what I saw. The key is the person’s inner world, the place in which people live and which shapes them. Painting is a descent in an underground. It’s dark and there’s everything that makes a man who he is.