The smell of paint fills the room as hip-hop beats through headphone speakers. Canvases are spread across the floor and rough sketches line the walls.
Daniel Mensah, a first-year graduate student majoring in painting from Ghana, pulls inspiration from his work space to incorporate hip-hop and graffiti into his artwork.
“I’ve been a strong passionate person about art, like almost every art. I just enjoy creating stuff,” Mensah said. “My specialty is more in spray paint, and I do a lot of graffiti and see how well I could bring it into the exhibition space.”
Mensah’s work uses a variety of silhouettes and colors to emphasize his messages and stand out from other artists.
“Despite me knowing how to paint acrylic, oil, watercolor and all those mediums, I wanted to find something unique,” Mensah said.
Growing up in the ‘90s, Mensah said he was inspired by American music and apparel, becoming heavily influenced by the culture.
“It was very interesting trying to copy the Western culture and especially American culture and what they do,” Mensah said.
Mensah credited hip-hop music with having the biggest impact on him, his art, and how he interprets hip-hop and his own culture. Albums like Good Kid, m.A.A.d City by Kendrick Lamar, 4:44 by Jay-Z, and artists like Tupac Shakur, 50 Cent, and Lil Wayne had a major impact on Mensah’s life.
Through his love of hip-hop, Mensah said he discovered graffiti and wanted to find ways to use it in his artwork. Graffiti drew him in because it allows people to send their messages quickly in different locations, he said. Mensah first practiced graffiti in Ghana and embraced the culture that came from that art form.
“Knowing how illegal it was, because it was vandalism, people were just going out of their way to destroy people’s buildings, which I’m not in support of, but I love the graffiti culture,” Mensah said. “I like the way you would have to hide to do it and try to create a piece.”
Despite any criticism Mensah receives about his art, he said he uses it as inspiration to improve his craft and lets it impact him in different ways.
“I don’t really call it negativity because I grew up on negativity,” Mensah said. “If you’ve been a kid like I have been, once you’re doing arts, they see you as a bad child, and you don’t want to learn, and your friends are doing science and why are you doing this. So I always take it as a flip to it.”
Mensah received a bachelor’s in fine arts in 2017 from Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Ghana. Mensah took some time off for work before being inspired by a friend to continue his education and pursue a master’s at Tech.
“I took it upon myself to come and see how I could progress, and I feel like it’s been such an amazing journey for me so far,” Mensah said.
Andrew Martin, a professor of art at Tech’s School of Art and Mensah’s former teacher, said he was a terrific student and artist. He said Mensah’s dedication and energy to his work was extremely high, and it is a delight he’s part of the graduate Master of Fine Arts program.
“He doesn’t only do what you would call graffiti-oriented work, he does easel-type or stretched canvases and that kind of work as well,” Martin said. “And he’s very good at all of that but it’s unusual, I think, to have somebody that has those sorts of combinations of interests and skills.”
Mensah said one way he’s trying to change people’s perception of graffiti is by incorporating elements of it into his pieces for exhibitions.
“I’m in a space where I’m seeing how well I could move graffiti from just being on walls and outdoors into like an exhibition space,” Mensah said.
He hopes his art style can inspire people, Mensah said. Specifically younger kids, who feel skeptical about getting into art.
“I want them to go for it and really do what they have to do. Learn the rules and break the rules,” Mensah said.
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