Danny Galieote
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Selected Sold Works
Danny Galieote Biography
Danny Galieote was born in Burbank, California at the hospital across the street from Disney Studios where he would end up working some 20 years later. He grew up watching his mother work with photography and plaster-casts, and his father engineer designs at a drafting table. As a result, his fascination with skilled art began at an early age. Drawing from the variety of farm and domestic animals his family’s small farm had provided Galieote with early practice and inspiration. A local teacher took his talent further, honing what he’d already developed from life.
Galieote went on to attend several colleges of art, including the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California Institute of the Arts and California State University Northridge. Straight out of college, he was chosen ahead of some 600 other applicants for an internship with Walt Disney Animation Studios. Through his 12 year career at the studio, Galieote quickly worked his way up from Assistant Animator to a fully-fledged Traditional (hand-drawn) Character Animator, while creating key historic moments in Disney classics like ‘The Lion King’, ‘Hunchback of Notre Dame’, ‘Hercules’, Tarzan’, ‘Atlantis’, ‘Treasure Planet’ and ‘Princess and the Frog’.
His years working at Disney ended up being an influential foundation for a future fine art career. At the Studios he studied cinematography, which allowed him to pull from the composition, craft, and fine art of film to incorporate it into his work. Galieote also cites classical work as an influence. He took frequent trips to Europe, immersing himself in drawings, paintings and sculpture from Italian Renaissance masters. Following a hiatus from Disney, he became an instructor of figure drawing and painting at Pasadena's Art Center College of Design and the Los Angeles Academy of Figurative Art. Throughout this time, Galieote further honed and refined his craft until 2011, when he decided to dedicate to a full-time fine art career in painting.
Galieote’s unique style takes cues from the drama and technical prowess of Italian Renaissance masters and the New-World optimism of American painters like Paul Cadmus, George Bellows, Thomas Hart Benton and Grant Wood. Pushing past strict stoicism, Galieote also adds a humor reminiscent of Rockwell. His work, though frequently featuring subjects and scenes from by-gone eras, does not concern itself with nostalgia; but rather with the pursuit of the universal timeless theme of human nature. His recent works of the American West, play off of these themes and combine with skill into his oeuvre, by way of memory from his early childhood on the southern California ranch.
Galieote’s works have been widely exhibited in galleries across the U.S. and are represented in numerous prestigious international collections. He has recently had several successful shows at in New York, Boston, and Maxwell Alexander Gallery in Los Angeles.
Selected Publications:
American Art Collector Magazine (Article May 2014), Catapult Art Magazine (Interview 2014), Persephone Magazine (Featured Article 2013), Eclectix Magazine (Featured Article 2013), Southwest Art Magazine (Featured Article 2013)
Education:
Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, CA 1991-1992
California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA 1990-1991
California State University Northridge, CA BFA 1988-1991