Ruarts Gallery presents I’ve been loving life for many years, a solo exhibition by Dmitry Tsvetkov, a well-known artist whose works feature in the collections of leading Russian museums. ‘I’ve Been Loving Life for Many Years’ is a poetic, image-rich pictorial manifesto about freedom, vitality, summer and the vacation that always ends, but remains in our memories. Begun in 2015, over the course of ten years the project has taken shape as a surreal, fragmentary picture of Tsvetkov’s world, where space is subject not to the laws of borders, but to artistic logic.

People travel to fill their lives with stories. Discovering new lands, searching for meaning and inspiration is a deep need of human nature. Dmitry Tsvetkov is not just a traveller, he is a collector of traces. The artist brought dozens of watercolour sheets from Russia, Italy and Montenegro: they depict seas, ships, airplanes and architectural fragments – a miniature archive of ‘personal touches’. His ‘fragmentary views’ become a metaphor for modern reality, its stratification and understatement.

The bottle objects were created especially for this exhibition. “I collect bottles with pieces of happiness – the fragrance of grass warmed by the sun, the sound of waves on rocks, the light on foliage and shadows from clouds. I put them on a shelf in my memory – these are moments that cannot be measured in money,” says Dmitry Tsvetkov. Each bottle bears an individual label with an image of an exotic bird and recognisable Tsvetkov characters. These ‘people’ fly, splash in blue waters, walk among ruins. Tsvetkov’s watercolours are an artistic utopia in which the body regains the right to move without sanctions. Freedom here is not an abstract concept, but a life position. In the artist’s world, bodies are spontaneous, movements are free, and belonging is determined not by nation, but by feelings.

“I leave the metropolis for a place where eagles soar in the sky and dolphins splash in the water in the morning... There are no investments, no Louvre or the word ‘simulacrum’ in those parts, instead there is something else, defined by a simple and great word – Life,” the artist reflects.

The key colour dominant of the exhibition is green. In different cultures it signifies an open path, a safety zone. For Tsvetkov this is not just aesthetics, but a visual code of freedom. And unlike real borders, this invisible line can be crossed by anyone who is ready to enter the gallery.