Daniel Green is only 29 years old, but when Days of Our Lives opens Thursday at Creativity Explored, it won’t be his first show. He’s already been featured in Create, a traveling exhibition curated by Lawrence Rinder at the Berkeley Art Museum, and at Southern Exposure, the Jack Fischer gallery and Outsider Artists at the Oakland International Airport.
When Green was a transitional student at Mission High School in 2008, teachers noticed his artistic talent, a fascination for pop culture and humor.
“Daniel has a unique drawing ability,” said Eric Larson about the characters that play a central role and catch your eye right away. Green quickly became a full-time artist working at the gallery and studio on 3245 16th Street. At the studio, teachers work with about 50 to 60 artists who have a developmental disability and a talent for art.
“Daniel doesn’t talk much, but when he does it’s to the point,” said Gilles Combet, one of Green’s teachers. Combet provides Green with recycled wooden blocks, paper, and cardboard as a drawing surface. The combination of wooden blocks covered with drawings in colored pencils, ink, and sharpie markers is delightful to the eye.
Green encompasses his drawings with thorough lists of dates and references to television shows, amongst other personal references.
The exhibit has more than 54 pieces in which his fascination for lists is clear and forces the viewer to look closer. The lists have one starting year in common: 1985, the year Green was born.
From 1985 on, Green’s memory is in charge and is poured over the different drawings of figures such as Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Giants, Star Trek, basketball players, sumo fighters, and video game characters but also Jesus, Lincoln and Washington.
As someone from Green’s same generation and living in the same city, I find the elements in his artwork easy to relate to. He is fascinated with the video game Street Fighter, which he juxtaposes with different locations in the city, therefore setting off your imaginationthe locations seem like a seamless fit for the video game’s fights: “Balrog vs Chun. Li 24th Street & Mission BART December 1st. Blanka vs Sagat 16th Street & Mission BART Station February 1st.”
Once you dedicate enough time to carefully read the lists, you start noticing his sense of humor. In a painting of sumo fighters, you suddenly run across lines such as ‘World’s Funniest Samoan Church Fight School Videos,” a clear humoristic reference to America’s Funniest Videos.
The compulsive listing is entertaining and provides a glimpse into Green’s personal life. The lists, however, are almost a distraction revolving around his brilliant drawings.
Days of our Lives will be on view through March 4th, 2015, at 3245 16th Street. The opening is today, Thursday, January 16, from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.
