We recently connected with David Čáp and have shared our conversation below.

David, appreciate you joining us today. Do you wish you had started sooner?

Often I think about the fact that I lost a lot of years by not being creative and that my path was not traditional in that I didn’t study at an art college and I was in a non-creative profession. But maybe that’s why I end up doing what I do and how I do it. It’s what defines me and maybe makes my story more interesting. There’s no point in trying to turn back the clock and regret things. I look forward and try to do what I really want to do, even if it is sometimes difficult. But yes, I often think about what it would have been like if I had started earlier.

David, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I have always had the creative urge and the desire to try and learn new creative techniques and to discover and invent new methods, just to do things differently from the others. Sometimes maybe in spite of others.

My first real creative profession was as a tattoo artist. I still do that today. And from the beginning I try to see tattooing only as a tool that I can use in a completely different way than some of the labels like oldschool, neotradiciuonal, tribal, realistic, etc.. I tried to create my own aesthetics that completely ignores all the others, does not come from them and to a certain extent defines itself against them. I have always been inspired by other artists – non-tattooers or the everyday things around me.

Tattooing was getting me tight. I love it, but sometimes it is diffucult to submit to the client and it is a big responsibility that affects me more and more the older I get. And that’s why I came back to painting and free art after a long break. I am creating abstract painting and again applying unconventional methods. I try to look for all possible ways to create a painting. It’s basically about new technologies. In a way I am questioning classical painting and again going against the stereotypes. But it is still important for me to achieve a certain aesthetic quality. The process itself is not more important to me than the result. Process is always subordinated to aesthetics. For example, the paintings from one of my series are created over several months by gradually drying big puddle of the paint. I don’t touch them at all. Each circle symbolizes a day. At night the temperature is lower, the water evaporates more slowly, while during the day it evaporates faster. Each imperfection symbolizes a bit of dust droped in a paint puddle, or some kind of shaking. It is basically a kind of recording medium full of information similar to a CD or DVD.

Recently I have been working on the creation of functional objects. These are unique pieces of furniture, which are created by papier-mâché technique. These are distinctive, absolute, sometimes ridiculous or caricatured shapes. I am again trying to see where the edge of visual difference and usable design can go. The aim is to create something that is different at first sight, exceptional but at the same time it does not lose its function. The chair is comfortable to sit on and does not get ruined in contact with water, even though it is made of paper. This is important to me.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

I had to get rid of the feeling that there must be a lot of work behind a good result. Often I’ve done something I really liked, but because it came too easily, I didn’t see enough value in it. I tried to work on it to get the result, but in the end I messed it up. I changed my perception from “It’s not good enough because it was too easy and quick to make” to “I’m good enough and that’s why I made it so quickly and easy”.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

It was only recently that I realized that my driving force was probably a lack of self-confidence and recognition from society. I managed to gain at least part of it and that’s why I’ve been losing a bit of motivation lately. I’m starting to feel the need to open up my work to some more serious topics and give it more depth. I think this opens a new phase of my work.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://davidcap.cz
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/david__cap/
• Other: tattoo instagram: https://www.instagram.com/daf647/