Daniel You

“A Surrealist on Olympus” – 2001 Sport Artist of the Year

“Painting is a language that I need to speak. Human nature reveals all the landscapes of the world. When I paint humans, I paint nature.” ~ Daniel You

If the magnificent and mischievous gods of ancient Greece had had their images recorded by a court artist on Mt. Olympus, the resulting portraits surely would have looked like the superb sports paintings by the French artist, Daniel You. His focus is on people, and his Surrealist portraits of mythic beings include symbolic glimpses of these imaginary gods’ defining stories, their strivings, triumphs and adversities. The issues raised from contemplating You’s works have the scope and relevance of a Greek tragedy. His paintings of bionically perfect bodies are at once immensely powerful, ecstatically erotic, and mysteriously sad. They pose more questions than answers to the conundrum of human existence. Precisely because these alluring images of physical perfection are freeze-framed in You’s paintings, they evoke meditations on movement, on the bittersweet speed of time and the fleeting nature of power and beauty.

Of French and Vietnamese heritage,You (pronounced yoh) spends part of the year in France and part in Vietnam, as well as travelling the globe to pursue different aspects of his work. He finds that immersing himself into a variety of art forms fuels his creativity. Acting is particularly inspiring because the new points of view experienced when he plays different characters enrich his paintings. As a result of a worldwide search for a sophisticated actor with both Vietnamese and European sensibilities,You was chosen for a key role in the film, Saigon Eclipse, released in 2007. Directed by Othello Khanh, the film won the Houston WorldFest International Film Special Jury Prize and was honored with Official Selection at both Shanghai International Film Festival and Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival.

“An artist needs to understand different people and occupations and live a variety of experiences in order for his art to grow. I love to be other characters when I am an actor in a film because then I can take the experience to my work.” ~ Daniel You

You began drawing and painting as a child. As a young man, You started his career as a designer of commercial art for posters, especially travel posters and sports posters promoting popular athletic events. You also worked designing furniture as well as logos for businesses. A keen interest in poster design has continued throughout his career and led him to create several Olympic Games images. In commemoration of the XXVI Olympic Games held in Atlanta, the French designer, Pierre Cardin, presented Sportif, his new line of clothes for active men and women. That same year in 2006, Cardin mounted a special exhibition, Les Dieux de Olympe, to showcase Daniel You’s Olympic-inspired paintings. Cardin’s perceptions of the power of symbolic tales was honed when he created costume designs for the great French filmmaker, Jean Cocteau, for the influential 1946 film, Beauty and the Beast, based on themes from Greek mythology. Cardin and You draw on Cocteau’s visions to inspire theirs. Cardin has continued to promote Daniel You’s paintings and to work with You as a designer of furniture and other items in Cardin’s luxury lines. You’s artistic pursuits keep him travelling the globe seeking inspiration and creating extraordinary images for the world to enjoy. Throughout all his ventures, You’s passion for the spirit and images of mythic gods has remained at the center of his visionary work.

“I choose my classic themes from the symbolic characters of mythology, especially Greek. Prometheus, Icarus, the Minotaur — the images and stories of all the gods inspire me.” ~ Daniel You

“A SURREALIST ON OLYMPUS” – 2001 SPORT ARTIST OF THE YEAR

You’s portraits of athletes present contradictory elements struggling for synthesis. His portrayals of demi-gods and bionic people are simultaneously intimate and detached, alluring and frightening, individual and archetypal, erotic and clinically anatomical, man and machine, human and divine. The tension among the opposing characteristics gives the images their intense vitality and feeling of otherworldly power.

You describes the major stylistic influence on his work as Surrealism, mainly referencing the works of the Belgian artist, Rene Magritte and the Spanish artist, Salvador Dali. His content is inspired by the tales of the Greek gods. You also refers to the impact on his work of the Classical painters, especially Eugene Delacroix. He cites the work of contemporary painter, Francis Bacon, as very influential, as well as the sculpture of Richard Mac Donald. The elegant robot from Friz Lang’s iconic 1927 film, Metropolis, is also one of the artist’s stylistic muses. These historic influences merge to inspire You’s unique contemporary vision of classically beautiful heroes with a 21st century technological twist. In ancient mythology, people sometimes merged with animals to acquire more power. You’s contemporary people are shown merged with machines for their energy sources. Many early Surrealists used hybrid human-object images to convey feelings from visions and dreams.

Artists in the Expressionist Movement of the late 19th century painted bucolic folklore themes fused with free fantasy images. The Surrealists of the 20th century took this process as inspiration and painted images of newly invented machines that were transforming their cultures fused with their individual free associations. Man no longer mingled with nature. Man mixed with machines. Daniel You’s images follow in this tradition while modernizing the symbols of transformation into fusions of flesh with chrome, of muscle with technology. The challenge to classical beauty by modern technology is played out in these images. They also pose contemporary versions of the eternal question of the nature of reality with its distortion by personal viewpoint. You cites the works of the painter, Francis Bacon, as influential on his art. Elements of the Expressionist Movement are evident in Bacon’s paintings and in You’s. The Expressionist’s attraction to violence, yearning for extremes in sensation, exaggeration of physical qualities, and unrealistic use of color to transmit emotion all figure in Bacon and You’s works. Working in the mid-20th century, Bacon added an obsession with urban scenes and photographic images to this list. You’s paintings emit a sense of being photographs also, though photographs of inhabitants of a time when photography did not exist, perhaps photographs of their spirits returned.

You also credits the art from Russian political posters from the 1930s and 1940s as influencing his paintings. You’s paintings share many powerful attributes with the public political art of these decades: a vision of a future world in which machines come to the aid of mankind, a monumental presentation of the human body, a spare content and minimal palette, and a mood of brooding quest for ultimate physical experience.

Though from an earlier century, Eugene Delacroix’s paintings contain elements that are useful in achieving the goals of 21st century Surrealists. Delacroix was remarkable for his romantic passion, his interest in the dialectic between thought and feeling, and his unconventional use of color. The dialogue between intellect and emotion is at the heart of much artistic dispute. The evolution of social attitudes on the topic is recorded by the stream of great art down through the centuries. Daniel You’s paintings constitute a kind of 21st century archetypal saga of the interplay of thought and action, of dream and reality, structure and time, human and divine.

You’s portraits are of gods, and gods don’t fade or lose their figures and faculties. Gods, like the super characters captured in You’s paintings, live forever at the height of their intense energies and youthful physiques. Daniel You’s images remind us that in our humanity, in our experience of physical strength and beauty, we too can have moments of godlike sensations when we feel omnipotent and powerful. For human athletes, these fleeting moments become a kind of perfection. We can hold them in our memories and relive them at will. We can look to them like photos in a journal in the same way that we look at You’s paintings for inspiration.

Our triumphal moments also can live in other people’s memories where they achieve a kind of immortality. This is the realm where sports and art merge most powerfully. Great art can inspire us to strive for excellence and then memorialize our triumphs. Art is a record of human striving for perfection. Images from the heights of Olympus have lifted Daniel You’s career to the heights of the art world. His remarkable paintings of mortals uniting with mythic heroes inspire us as imperfect humans to strive for our perfect dreams.

Daniel You – “A SURREALIST ON OLYMPUS” – 2001 SPORT ARTIST OF THE YEAR

2000

Sports Artist of the Year, United States Sports Academy, Alabama

Pierre Cardin collaborates on line of furniture designed with Daniel You

2007

Actor in film, Saigon Eclipse, directed by Othello Khanh

Saigon Eclipse wins Houston WorldFest International Film special Jury Prize

2008

Paintings Exhibition to Commemorate the XXVI Olympic Games, Atlanta

2010

Paintings Exhibition, Paris