We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Danny J Martinez. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Danny J below.

Danny J, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. When did you first know you wanted to pursue a creative/artistic path professionally?

I think it all started the day I heard my daughter tell her friend, “That’s my dad’s office. He yells at people in there”. In that moment, I’m pretty sure you could visibly see my heart break, like when Lisa Simpson broke Ralph Wiggum’s heart on the “Choo-choo-choose you” episode of The Simpsons. This was during the pandemic and I was working my corporate IT job from home, and work was just bleeding through all facets of my life. Hearing her say this caused a shift in me, where I just knew something needed to change. Shortly after that, after much discussion with my fiance, I made the decision to leave my job to focus on my education and enjoying more time with my family.

After a few months of drifting around and studying for some certifications, I started drawing again. And this started the dominos falling of me tumbling into an art career. I started putting down lines in a sketchbook again and seeing where my mind would take me. That led to the decision to try and do a full painting on a canvas for a local Chicago pop-up show, which then led to trying to take on the Inktober online drawing challenge. From there I just started to get more and more invitations to different pop-up shows in Chicago, then to Galleries, and even started to have some collectors take interest in what I was doing. Once I sold a few paintings and drawings, the idea of making a career out of one of my passions (the others being Basketball and 90s R&B) started to seem feasible and something I felt I at least needed to try. Since then, I have been striving to create the things I want to see while trying to make a career out of it.

With all that being said, I’ve always known that I wanted to be an artist from the moment I drew my first Ninja Turtle (Leonardo) when I was 4 years old.

Danny J, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I am an artist/illustrator from Joliet, which is a suburb of Chicao, IL. My work blurs the line between realism, illustration, cartoons, comics, literary references to create a blend of tangible surrealism that pulls the viewer into each piece. I hope that my work both asks and answers some questions on the absurdity of existence. I use this blend of surrealism as a means of self-discovery, drawing on my experiences and the experiences of my community, to convey emotion and storytelling through multiple visual mediums.

I’m not sure if anything sets me apart from other artists. If anything it’s that I found my language with art, and have been focusing on creating what feels right to me. I am most proud of my wife and daughter, who are everything to me.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

I built my audience on social media one drawing, one painting, and one art show at a time. I started doing the 31 day Inktober drawing challenge, while also joining numerous Chicago area pop-up shows, which snow-balled into invitations to numerous galleries. It was a wild ride: I went from having my art hanging in a local bar to somehow having my first solo show with Vertical Gallery in Chicago, to having my work shown on the West Coast and overseas with the fine folks at Thinkspace. I don’t have the biggest social media presence, but I am hoping that will change once I get more of these TikTok dances down. My advice would be to stay true to yourself and create the art that you want to see in the world.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

The most difficult part of being an artist is sitting alone in my studio, staring at blank canvas with the canvas staring back. However, the pendulum swings the other way as I work my way through the challenge and process of getting the ideas and images that I have in my brain to filter through my eyes and hands and somehow translate onto those blank canvas or paper. The most fulfilling aspect is when the art is finally complete and hung up for others to see, and I finally get that feedback and the discussion and interpretation of the work.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://thinkspaceprojects.com/artists/danny-martinez-aka-van-dam-one/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/vandamone/
• Other: https://verticalgallery.com/collections/van-dam-one