On my practice

My work begins with things I find: an image in the street, a fragment washed ashore, a colour or a line that catches my attention. I spent most of my life by the sea. As a child, I gave the objects I found stories and magical properties. That way of looking still shapes my painting.

I think of each work as a child’s pocket full of collected objects. These fragments enter the painting alongside colour, lines and figures, forming layered compositions that are close to collage. Some remain visible; others disappear as the work develops.

I consciously move away from what I learned through academic drawing, allowing a composition to be ‘wrong’. I try to step back and let the painting develop spontaneously. I am interested in how the stories carried by found objects meet the visual language of painting, and what happens when they become part of a new pictorial reality.

Pavel Rtue · Adapted from his artist statement, 2026