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It's an old-Nashville story, with a new-Nashville twist. Alic Daniel moved to Nashville five years ago with a dream to become a rockstar. Today, he's a cutting-edge visual artist setting a high bar for Nashville's emerging fine arts community. Daniel's 'scribble” paintingsa method he uses where bold, calligraphic script tests the rules of legibilityare winning both critical praise and commercial success in Nashville and beyond.
At just 24 years old, Daniel has barely allowed the ink to dry on his 2015 fine-arts degree from Belmont. A first impression of him might not immediately point to Daniel as that artistthe one with prominent murals in restaurants Le Sel and The Treehousethe artist who is making waves at Oz Arts Nashville and whose work sells through The Red Arrow Gallery. Friendly, smiling, and a gregarious talker, Daniel might not strike you, at first, as the intense, contemplative creator that he is: a painter as deeply immersed in the traditions of art history as he is committed to making a new kind of art for now and the future.
'We always went to art museums on family vacations,” Daniel recalls. 'All the Old Masters: Henri Matisse, Van Gogh,” he laughs, 'I hated it, growing up.”
But that steady exposure to great art, plus rigorous studio-art study at his Ohio high school, left Daniel with two core convictions. First, artists need to know their art history. Additionally, artists need to create with intention. 'With both, you can commit to a very confident art,” he says.
For Daniel, a composition begins with his own kind of research. 'I read a lot. I study work by other artists, other art that's working now,” he explains. Inspiration comes from the pastCy Twombly, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Frank Stella, Keith Haringand also from the momentEddie Martinez, Daniel Holland, Retna, Zio Ziegler, among many others.
'I read and look; then, I sketch. I get ideas down on a page. I spend a lot of time thinking. It's really meditation,” he says.
But once Daniel starts painting a 'scribble” piece, careful research ends, and pure expression takes over. 'On the canvas, it's one gesture, one continuous idea in the moment. I even try to use my whole arm, not just my hand or wrist,” he says. Each script-like line dictates the next; each line is the result of the movement before.
'It's improvisation. The first mark sets the compositional rule, but every line that follows builds and adds ideas to create the whole picture,” Daniel explains.
And when that picture is finished? 'I'm not that into it when it's done,” he admits. 'I don't really go back and refine it.” In fact, if he decides a composition needs work, he's most likely to paint over it and start again. 'I try to trust myself, try to trust the meditation that made the work in the first place,” he says. Daniel takes special care with materials to support this fluid, in-the-moment technique. 'I sand the canvas very smooth, and thin out the pigment, like mixing ink with alcohol, so it flows easily and with the least friction,” he says.
The result of this intense mix of study and gesture is art that puts us in compelling conversation with the artist, even when his script isn't script at all. Daniel hopes to keep pushing those expressive limits.
'I'm experimenting with other kinds of media, like translating the ‘scribble' gesture into a sculptural form. I'm working now with local fabricators in wood and metal, and that's very exciting. It's a great thing about working in Nashville right now,” he says.
Alic Daniel is convinced the Nashville arts community can aim for serious national attention. His own early supporters, like Le Sel's Max and Benjamin Goldberg, have helped him build that foundation for himself. 'I want to sell my work everywhere,” Daniel insists. And given his explosive start, it certainly looks like he will.