DANIEL ADEL

(b. 1962)

“I paint engine parts and crumpled pieces of paper because I am allergic to fruits and flowers, and especially to paintings of them.”

So says Daniel Adel in an effort to explain his choice of the subject matter; engine parts, and crumpled pieces of paper that feature prominently in the brilliantly executed oil paintings he creates.  And while many look at Adel’s paintings in the context of still life imagery, he contentiously argues that many of his works should be located instead in a middle zone between the traditional categories of landscape and still life.  “If you look closely behind the main object in many of my paintings,” he says, “there are elements of horizons, reflections in bodies of water and clouds. The suggestion of deep space is in opposition to the proximity of the objects in the foreground.”

It is clear that Daniel Adel walks a path much different than that of the “traditional,” realist painter and that the interplay of these formal oppositions add a conceptual depth to the work that goes beyond the mere recording of visual experience.