Q: What are some of your favorite things about living and working in the Brooklyn neighborhood, Vinegar HIll?

A: Vinegar Hill is the most visually inspiring neighborhood in New York. In my 20’s I spend almost five years living in Europe, and upon my return to NY, I discovered Vinegar Hill; it reminded me of the old country, with its cobblestone streets and 19^th-century townhouses. However, within the radius of four small city blocks you also have a neoclassical mansion, a Tibetan Monastery, and a defunct power plant. 

Q: How and when did you first become interested in art and illustration?

A: I was a spoiled youngster. I grew up in New York, raised in a home full of artwork mostly by artists from the tradition of Polish film and circus poster design which i found immensely gratifying. And my home was a sort of Underground Railroad for Polish bohemians during the Cold War, including many jazz musicians and visual artists. I often frequented the museums, having practically memorized the permanent collection of the MOMA before I could walk. 

Q: Do you keep a sketchbook? What is the balance between the art you create on paper versus In the computer?

A: I draw on old paper. I have a preference for it with its warm tone, texture and history. I often draw on found ephemera scripting new stories from old ones.

Q: What is the most important item in your studio?

A: My collection of old books and magazines.

Q: What was your favorite book as a child?

A: The Giving Tree, by Shel Silverstein

Q: What is the most interesting book you’ve recently read?

A: The Orientalist, by Tom Reiss

Q: Who and what are some of your strongest influences?

Q: Well other than some of the great Polish poster artists like Henryk Tomaszewski and Franciszek Starowieyski, I am also very fond of the paintings of Neo Rauch, and sculptures of Erwin Wurm. 

Q: What was your first professional assignment and how did you get it?

A: A family friend with a burgeoning record label hired me to create the album art for a guitarist with no arms. I painting the whole illustration in oil paints. I was very ambitious then, but not nearly as ambitions as playing chords with one's toes.

Q: What are some of your favorite places/books/blogs/websites for inspiration?

A: Lately I spend a lot of time at Pioneer Works, Center for Art and Innovation, in Redhook, Brooklyn. They have a great curriculum of art performances and educational programs. I also like 50watts very much for highlighting the very best of 20^th-century book illustration. I subscribe to designboom which inspires me daily with cross-disciplinary innovations.

Q: What was the last art exhibition you saw and what did you take away from it?

A: I just caught Jordan Wolfson’s animatronic stripper robot at David Zwirner, it was really out there. I rarely see such sophisticated technology used in art.

Q: What is your favorite part of the creative process? 

A: Concepting is certainly the most challenging, but perhaps the most gratifying is successfully replicating an idea into a physical piece of artwork, and then being surpassed by the unexpected.

Q: How do you go about finding great clients?

A: I generally don’t look for clients. I instead try and forge relationships with interesting people that often lead to collaboration

Q: What would be your last supper?

A: Pizza and french fries

Q: What advice would you give a young artist on selecting an art school or college?

A: I would say, rather than getting a traditional art school education, study academics and apprentice to a master artist; supplement this with relevant course work. To be distinguished in today’s world it’s certainly not enough to draw or paint well; you must have excellent ideas drawn from a wealth of knowledge and experience. 

Note: Daniel’s work can be seen in CutlogNY 2014, at L’inlassable Galerie, May 8-11, at The Clemente, 107 Suffolk Street,NYC.  
The artwork shown here is from a street art action for Paris drawing Week 2014, in conjunction with his show at L’inlassable Galerie, Paris, in March.

Daniel Horowitz is a Brooklyn-based artist working in a variety of media whose work has been exhibited in New York as well as internationally. Horowitz is the winner of the Scope Miami 2011 Artists Wanted competition in painting. In March of 2013 a selection of his ‘365’ project was selected to be exhibited at Christie’s New York and most recently at the Warsaw Museum of Modern Art. His illustration work has been recognized by American Illustration, The Society of Illustrators, 3 × 3 Magazine, and by Creative Quarterly: Journal for Art and Design and has been published everywhere from The New York Times and Wall Street Journal, to GQ, Grove/Atlantic, and Knopf.