About the artist

I painted before I could write. For a long time it was a quiet joy beside ordinary life — sketchbooks in pockets, paints at weekends. Then one day the paintings took over the whole table, then the whole room, and the decision was made.

Today painting is both my craft and my language. Every canvas begins with a question I cannot answer; it is finished the moment I no longer need the question.

I am not interested in how things look, but in how they stay in the body once you close your eyes. A landscape after rain, a face remembered only by touch, a light that lasted a second.

I paint slowly; every layer has to dry, to remember something and to forget something. I believe a painting should be quieter than the world around it — so that you can be heard in it.

I begin on the floor — the canvas lies flat, paint is poured and finds its own way. At that stage I am more witness than author. Only then does the painting go up on the wall and a dialogue begins: palette knife, rag, dry brush, layer after layer.

Some paintings take a week; others live with me for a year. The most stubborn ones I turn to the wall and let them wait until we have had it out.

My studio is in an old Prague tenement with north-facing windows. The light stays even and calm all day — ideal for layering colour. It always smells of turpentine and coffee.

Visits are possible by appointment. You can see the paintings in person — and if you like, I will show you the ones that are not finished yet.