Daniel is almost alone in his mastery of the demanding technique of stone lithography. Virtually no other artists currently working are able to achieve anything near his subtlety of color and fine detail in stone lithography. A stone lithograph begins with the artist drawing on a perfectly flat slab of limestone in grease crayon. The slab is wet with water and then inked with an oily ink. The ink is attracted to the grease crayon lines and repelled by the wet areas of the slab. Paper is applied to the slab, and both slab and paper are subjected to a heavy press. This entire process must be repeated for each color. Color registry, or placing the colors on another slab in precisely the right position for each successive color, is another daunting part of the task, as is exactly positioning the paper when printing the second, third or fourth colors. It is the reason lithography editions are smaller than those of other printmaking methods.
One critic observed that Daniel’s work is united by a “keen observation and attention to detail with virtuoso drawing skills that create a pure and precise vision of the beauty and vulnerability of Hawai‘i’s wildlife.” His numerous distinctions (too many to list here) include being named Hawai‘i Audubon Society Artist 1989-90 and Hawai‘i Ducks Unlimited Artist 1992 & 1994. His works are part of the permanent collections of Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, the Hawai‘i State Foundation on Culture and the Arts, and the Honolulu Academy of Arts. Included in his public and private commissions are the 1997-98 Hawai‘i State Conservation Stamp and illustration of the award-winning children’s book Flight of the Golden Plover. After a hiatus on Guemes Island in Washington state, Daniel has returned to Hawai‘i and lives in Honolulu.
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