Daniel MAILLET

Daniel MAILLET was born in Zurich in 1956, studied visual communication at the CSIA in Lugano and continued his training as an engraver with his father Leo Maillet, a well-known German expressionist painter. From 1983 he studied painting at the Brera Academy in Milan. His work focuses on drawing life-size figures through the study of life-size models. His portraits are characterized by a contemporary expressionist realism, without neglecting the old figurative tradition of Mediterranean and Central European culture. Late in life he began modeling clay sculptures, working with clay and a method that allows him to sculpt clay figures in a single block. In 2002, Maillet moved to Brazil, created clay sculptural groups and his paintings took on color. He came into contact with Japanese ceramists living in the Brazilian tropics, built a studio and a new concept of a high-temperature kiln. The large-scale figurative sculpture in stoneware represents an important technical and expressive breakthrough for Daniel, thanks to the sintering of clay and the poetic possibilities offered by the art of fire – a language not learned in art institutes and academies and in contemporary sculpture is rarely used. Daniel recently moved to Monferrato Astigiano, from where he maintains contacts with Switzerland and Brazil to spread the art of stoneware sculpture. His portraits are essential and direct, with existence at the center of his poetics: in his own way, he follows in his father’s footsteps in terms of research and craft in figurative art, far from the mainstream.