Jan Mikulka

Still life with a shell and an elephant, oil on canvas, 150 x 100 cm, 2019

Composition with Quinces and Elephant, oil on canvas, 100 x 70, 2020

Jan Mikulka is a Czech painter specializing in still life painting, figural and portrait work. He has won The Royal Society of Portrait Painters competition in London three times, which is the most prestigious international competition showcase of contemporary portraiture.[1] In 2011 he won the BP Portrait Award, and two years later the first self-portrait award (SELF Portrait Prize, 2013),[2] and in 2016 the Changing Faces Prize was also awarded to him by The Royal Society of Portrait Painters.In his still lifes, Jan Mikulka plays with the viewer's perception of reality and the illusion of space. The installations take up several square meters, preparing the still life for the painting, so that the objects, from the viewer's perspective, eventually appear on the canvas exactly as the author intended. The displayed objects form a complex visual matrix of the relationships between the selected objects themselves, the author and his intention towards the audience. Jan Mikulka, a painter and a graduate of professor Zdeněk Beran's studio at the Prague Academy of Fine Arts, has achieved acclaim in international competitions and is one of the few Czech painters to receive commissions from high-ranking customers from Great Britain to the Gulf. Since the artist works mostly on commission, we do not see his works very often on the open art market.