We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Dani Papa a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Dani, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?

Finding a connection to meaningful projects – that is, projects that fuel your impassioned heart – is a manner of inspiration. My mother always said that “inspiration is the beauty of art,” and that succinct statement has stuck with me through my schooling and artistic journey. Inspiration is everywhere… in everything. I find myself tethered to each work I create in some capacity; whether that is through nonsensical doodling chronicled in my sketchbook or a live painting performance created during a concert event. I find meaning in my work through my creative release. I’m known for creating constantly, non-stop – from finishing 104-page sketchbooks every two months or so, to instinctively painting live at events, to completing large-scale grand narrative altarpieces for my graduate studies – I find meaning. The first “project” that fueled my artistry was my Moleskine Sketchbook series that I started around 2020. I began drawing incessantly – everywhere: from coffee shops and bars to beaches and clubs. I began my nomadic studio practices, continuously filling these Moleskine sketchbooks, hopping from place to place, soaking up the energy of the environment and channeling it into my studio practices. I’m currently working on my 30th sketchbook and intend to volumize and reproduce them in print so that others may find meaning in the first major project that drove my ambition.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My name is Dani Papanikolaou (or Papa for short), and I am a mixed media painter and sketchbook artist that explores saturation and line in a variety of forms, usually with nude figures as my vehicle for expression. My style and aesthetic is inspired by urban tribalism, which is rooted in Neo-Expressionism, abstraction, action painters, and street art, with an exploration in mark-making and color dissonance. As a live painting performer, I transcend improv to instinct with each canvas and practice.

I was born and raised in Florida and have lived in many parts of the state, though currently living and working in Naples, FL. I have been an educator, mentor, and community leader for the past nine years while residing in Southwest Florida. My long-term goals reside in continuing education, essentially branching off into the university realm and philanthropic efforts once I finish my MFA in Painting candidacy online at Savannah College of Art & Design (SCAD).

My love of portraiture and the human form stems from an interest in exploring the human psyche through abstraction and expression. I employ automatic drawing processes into my practices as a tool to help release my creative potential. Color is often bold, bright, and totally outrageous and unapologetic. This utilization of color adds another layer of complexity to my work, sparking emotional responses that are genuine and unfiltered.

I am a storyteller that creates grand narrative altarpieces and reimagined Greek myths. I enjoy exploring aesthetic and subject-matter perceptual shifting into my artistry, where the viewer taps into both realms of materiality and intentionality. With my style and application of mark-making, I appreciate the materiality of the medium as an aesthetic and tactile texture, but also for its relationship to the other elements and medium at play that form repetitious pattern-work. Similarly with my subjects, I enjoy how my figures, for example, read as urban characters as well as divine beings within the intended context. I select my models to complement my theme and vice versa.

I paint to understand human behavior; the impulses that drive a journey forward. I employ my skills and techniques to my passions in Greek mythology to create allegorical content, but in a fresh, urbanized, and virtuous manner. These allegories parallel human behavior with familiar concepts that are universally understood: love, greed, gratitude, inspiration, practice, self-fulfillment, self-doubt, transformation, etc… My figures are metaphysical-like beings that are trapped outside reality but given a glimpse into this world through a window (substrate) that they inhabit. Growing up, the only connections I had with my Greek heritage was through studying myths and legends. Now, I am using these Greek tales to explore my identity through reimagined allegories that express love and life.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

For me, the most rewarding aspect of being an artist would have to be the smiles. Whether slowly analyzing each page of a completed sketchbook or marveling at the grandiose stature of my grand narrative altarpieces, viewers are often caught smiling. These smiles bring me joy, which in turn, fuels my artistry to continue exploring, experimenting, and expressing myself – which I’ve dubbed as my “three ex’s” lol. – but honestly, I light up inside with each smile.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

During the 2023 Winter Quarter at SCAD, I was working hard on my project in my studio. At the time, I was exploring the myth of Eros & Psyche as an allegory about self-doubt and how love cannot live without trust. With only a week before the final presentation, I had just finished rendering the portraits of both models in graphite. I brought both panels down off my wall to varnish them outside, when I decided to retrieve my India Inks off my top shelf (so I may begin applying watered-down washes later outside). I slipped! The entire box came crashing down onto both portraits that I had just placed on the floor. Puddles and splashes of colors covered both portraits… the same portraits that took me weeks to complete were now ruined. Finding strength and resilience in my practices, I took both wooden panels outside and sanded down the intense, saturated layers of color to reveal a ghost-like image of my rendered portraits. With only four days until my final presentation, I pulled three all-nighters reworking the figures by modeling a thin layer of white acrylic paint on top – like a pseudo-sfumato effect. When I finally presented “Eros & Psyche: The Allurement of Self-Doubt,” both my professor and peers were in awe. The last stage they saw were both graphite portraits near completion. All were in complete shock once I continued with my presentation with images of my accident. I explained how I trusted my process and practices and allowed myself to fall in love with the work once again, overcoming any traces of self-doubt that lingered in my head (clearly I’m living my artwork). Trust your instincts and you’ll be amazed at what you discover.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://danipapa.com/
• Instagram: @papanikolaou.dani
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dani-papa-836030bb/

Image Credits
Juan Espinosa, Justin Kaczmarek, Eddie Kopp, Galit Papanikolaou