Daniel Hanifan, the famous artist who’s ‘redefined art and cinema,” is creating an immersive experience for guests of the Georgia Entertainment Roadshow that highlights all that the creative economy in South Georgia is aspiring to be. The event will be hosted on January 26, 2024 at the Rainwater Conference Center in Valdosta – which happens to display Daniel Hanifan’s art on the walls throughout the newly renovated Conference space.
Hanifan developed his creative skills at a very young age in Detroit. In his 20’s he became ready for prime time and began knocking on doors of local TV studios, asking them if they were interested in some of his “stuff.” It turned out they were, and young Daniel was able to sell them some of the creations he had made for use on local television programming. His approach to life as a young entrepreneur and his genuine talent served him well. A creative force was born.
“I made anything I thought they could use he says, from flying saucers to props to costumes, anything I could make with my hands,” says Hanifan. He was an ambitious young man creating materials for television studios. “I started making all kinds of stuff for a variety of shows, all kinds of displays from cars to any oddball project they needed built, Hanifan says. “I learned a lot about hydraulics and pneumatics and other mechanical effects to make the stuff more effective and it all seemed to work well. They also wanted me to do hats, costumes and props, anything bizarre or out of the box, and soon I was sending things out for performers in Las Vegas and New York. That was all very exciting; it seemed like the big time.”
These jobs led to other work, building displays for corporations, mascot costumes for minor league baseball teams, almost anything that was creative and unusual. Hanifan was also attending the University of Michigan then, but he really wanted to get more into the entertainment business and took a job as entertainment director for a couple of theme parks. At the age of twenty-three he moved to a small town on the border of Georgia and Florida and devoted his talents to creating surprise and delight.
Then a pivotal event occurred, when a friend, who was an art collector asked him to create something on a big scale, 7-feet by 12-feet, a massive piece of fine art. Right out of the gate Daniel Hanifan had found a medium to which he had probably been pointing all along. The larger scale work became a specialty of his, works not only of width and breadth, but of great depth and energy, works that tell a story of emotion and spirit. In the years since that first seminal work, Hanifan has produced thousands of works, in many different styles coming from a variety of inspirations, all pointing back to the ultimate truth of creating art: being a messenger. Because ultimately all is up to the observer and Hanifan knows that.
“When people ask me what inspires me, I always tell them the ideas come from within,” explains Hanifan. “It could come from the dance of Agnes DeMille or the poetry of Sandburg or Frost. It might be from a dream at night, a vision that I will then try to capture in a large-scale work. I like to use the analogy of a hunter who seeks his game, and enjoys challenge and spirit of the hunt, but then the final result is something static and final. My process of painting is very alive and exciting, and I get lost in it sometimes, and then when it’s all finished, I can see what it turned out to be. The final finished piece of art is like the trophy.”
Hanifan recalls, “I was once working on a feature film and the director asked me what I thought art was. I was grasping for answers”. “Art is the expression of pain and all that comes out of that experience,” John Irvin, the British Director of many films said. “It took me a while to understand it at the age of twenty-six. But the truth is, there is really no growth unless one understands and can express the human condition and through that inspire others”. The art Hanifan started expressing has touched others greatly over the decades.
To read the full feature, visit Spotlight News Magazine.
