Petr Zatloukal. Found Still Lifes
In the series Found Still Lifes, Petr Zatloukal (13. 9. 1956, Kojetín) develops one of his early photographic narrative strategies, based on an organic connection between a surreal and documentary view of the world. For more than thirty years, he has been working with the principle of objet trouvé, through which he captures the everyday environment—a world that never ceases to fascinate him.
His still lifes include objects shaped by natural processes as well as artifacts of human activity: scrap metal, remnants of workshop equipment, and anonymous objects forgotten in brownfields and abandoned shops. These found situations, discovered in the corners of cities around the world and doomed to gradual extinction, did not originally aspire to become art. However, the photographer’s attentive gaze and creative gesture give them new meaning—they are recorded, reevaluated, and presented as unique visual testimonies to transience.