A Beauty Eclipsed

Daniel Du

ARTIST STATEMENT

Longing is one of the most powerful human emotions. We long for things to make sense and to see order and purpose in our lives, especially in times of transition, after times of crisis, or even in the liminal moments between our busyness. Having lived in various cities in China, the United States, and now Canada, I am confronted by the tension of these longings as they press against the realities of life. My paintings combine and present potentially conflicting and paradoxical dualities by merging intimate and public spaces, combining the sacred and the profane, obscuring something beautiful while fully displaying the grotesque, and depicting hurried living versus slow ritual. In these juxtapositions, my work attempts to be an earnest mediation of life’s everyday mysteries that produce wonder and curiosity.

My paintings are all oil paintings on canvas. Evoking the centuries-long tradition of artists constructing the illusion of three-dimensional landscapes and still life in oil, I want to use oil paint’s ability to depict light and shadow to affect the senses and draw the viewer into impossible spaces. Also drawing more contemporary reflections of the canvas as an object, I work on a scale to envelop the viewer in these spaces. I also break up these scenes on multiple canvases to heighten potential disconnect and create pauses in my visual storytelling.