Wojciech Pater

Szczawina, Poland •

Artist (Painting) •

Born 1981 •

Hi there!
My name is Wojciech Pater aka Fladrif. I'm a painter and a graphic designer. I live and work in Poland. I'm dealing with oil painting since around 1997. Oils are my main and favorite tools of creation.

I look for inspiration in the no man's lands between reality and dream – among the ephemeral beings, parallel worlds, micro and macro-cosmic forms, but also among the phenomena of everyday life and in the contemplation of the beauty of wildlife.

For me to paint is to tell a story. It's an inner journey into the hidden side of things.

After years of experimentation and exploration of my artistic way I developed two methods of expression. The result of this search are two styles in which I paint - surrealism and traditional landscape painting. They are quite clearly separated and develop in their own way.

I'm a totally self-taught artist. I learn everything by my own and I see it as my big value. This is a consequence of my conscious choices, and thanks to that I manage to stay completely independent and free in creation. Instead of study fine arts, I decided to explore natural sciences and my love for art remains pure, free from academic influences and school programs.

More surrealistic paintings are mostly the result of improvisation - striving for automatism and trance at an early stage, but soon afterwards, when the first forms are shaped, they begin to orbit somewhere around the idea. I just hold on tight the brush while the painting comes out of my head and begins to live its own life, transforming and evolving. I teach myself to observe this process, to listen to it and to follow.

Landscape painting, on the other hand, are mainly based on my journeys through the mountains, meadows and forests of the wild parts of Europe. This is inseparably linked with the places where I come from and which I call home - the Sudety Mountains in south of Poland. Through painting I can more fully experience their beauty, and the beauty of the world itself. Recently I paint mostly in the studio but I happened sometimes to get out in the open air. Because I use glazing and I do not paint ala prima I prefer to do some field notes and then get back to the studio. Recently, however, I'm starting to get back to impasto painting, so maybe it will be impulse to go out into the fields with an easels.

I was selling my paintings for several years, but always directly. Recently I decided to put them on sale on the internet - and here I am.