Melanie Daniel

Originally from Canada, Melanie Daniel is currently working in Tel Aviv-Jaffa, Israel. Facing possible apocalypse, the humans in her rich narrative world forge a Mad-Max D.I.Y. method, trying to save or recreate a nature threatened with extinction. They have adopted various methods to adapt and survive, sometimes with ambiguous results, other times humorously hopeless. They still attempt the mundane tasks of daily life, but in an inhospitable world they appear unmoored. Her paintings poignantly capture this pervading duality of utopian and dystopian narratives.

Daniel’s psychedelic, unnatural palette, dense areas of vibrating pattern, and skewed perspectives underscore the uneasy relationship between the subjects and their environment. The result of nature overwhelming the human presence is reminiscent of Jules de Balincourt, Hernan Bas, or Lisa Yuskavage. Daniel’s big, brash, and strangely beautiful works are cautionary yet hopeful. They show the resilience of nature, as plants and flowers intermingle with graffitied ruins and threaten to overrun the canvas.

After studies in Canada, Melanie Daniel completed her BFA and MFA at Bezalel Academy, Israel. Daniel has had numerous exhibitions in Israel and abroad, including solo exhibitions at Mindy Solomon Gallery, Miami, the Grand Rapids Art Museum, Michigan, the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Israel, Chelouche Gallery, Tel Aviv, Ashod Museum of Art, Israel, Shulamit Gallery, Los Angeles, Kelowna Art Gallery, BC, and Noga Gallery of Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv, among others. Her work is included in collections such as the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Harvard Business School, and the Brandes Family Art Collection. She has received press in publications such as Border Crossings Magazine, Young Space New York, Maake Magazine, Artnet, Newsweek, Frieze, Haaretz, CBC/Radio Canada, The Huffington Post, Beautiful Decay, and the Artists Magazine. Daniel is the recipient of a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, a New York Foundation for the Arts Grant, the 2009 Rappaport Prize for a Young Israeli Painter, a Creative Capital Grant, and the NARS Foundation Residency in New York City. She recently completed a position as the Padnos Distinguished Artist-in-Residence at Grand Valley State University, MI.