“Your expressive and detailed oriented paintings are inspired by a cultural perspective that incorporates myth and personal vision to convey a sense of the sublime in nature and women.”
—Angela Di Bello
Davíd Joaquín was born in San Diego, California in 1968. He was raised in San Diego, California and in Hawaii. He is mainly a self taught artist, beginning his art endeavors from elementary school depiciting very detailed illustrations of football plays, to high school creating and producing an award winning short film annimation, to later running and owning his own gallery in New Zealand.
His mother (who emigrated from Colombia) is a weaver and a woodcarver. She became his first art teacher.“When I was a child I was surrounded by art. My mother built our house by hand with recycled wood. All the cabinets, beds, and mouldings were beautifully carved and adorned with painted vines and flowers. I remember in our room she had carved a piece of dark wood, and on it painted the starsign characters of everyone in the family.”
He began his works of visions and dreams, working with exotic woods such as milo, koa, hau, and mango.“Having a sweat lodge in Hawaii exposed me to many different tribes (Lakoa, Zuni, Ute, Crow) who would come to sweat with the family, each with different stories and ways, shared in the hot darkness. This is what I began to ‘see’ in my dreams and in wood grains and thus encouraging me to study my own native heritage (Chibcha from Colombia and Mi’kmaq from Quebec)."
Most recenly, Davíd has expanded his technique using the palette knife with oils on canvas to create his works of Western scenes.
His illustrations have appeared in such publications as “The Land and People of the Colorado Plateau”, “ Dreams- Science Art and the Unconscious Mind” and most recently “Mountain Spirit The Sheepeater Indians of the Yellowstone” and is presently illustrating “Rock Art of the High Pains”. He has exhibited in California, Hawaii, New Mexico, Oregon, Washington, France, Germany & New Zealand.
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