By DuEwa M. Frazier
Danny Simmons is more than an artist. On any given day you might catch him in the midst of one of the many worlds he is a part of. If you watch MTV, you may view him bantering with his brothers Russell and Joseph “Rev. Run” Simmons on the reality show Run’s House. Check out an episode of HBO’s Def Poetry Jam and you will see his name listed as a producer. Visit Danny’s Rush Philanthropic Arts Foundation in Manhattan or his Brooklyn-based Corridor Gallery, to discover the arts-in-education programs for youth and exhibitions for underrepresented artists that he sponsors. Follow him around for a week or two and you may find him at a Barnes & Noble reading from his new book or at a board meeting for prominent cultural and learning institutions. If you have lived in Brooklyn for any length of time, you may have been a privileged guest at one of Danny’s annual summer soirees in Fort Greene featuring a multicultural “who’s who” in the art, music, television, literary and fashion worlds in New York City. Despite the influence he has within the arts community, Danny Simmons is not a multitasker on a power trip. He is instead, a renaissance man who humbly serves his people through a steady commitment to the arts and a willingness to submit to the creative impulses he experiences on a daily basis.
On the day of my interview with Danny, I arrived at his home to find a crew of people moving art and painting the walls, in preparation for an upcoming exhibition at the Corridor Gallery. When I walked through the door of his house, Danny greeted me with a familiar, “Hey DuEwa, how’s it going?” and a hug. Standing over six feet tall, Danny is a warm giant of a man. He makes you feel right at home in his space. A longtime friend of my father’s (jazz musician Eric Frazier), I first met Danny back in 2000 at an event he invited my dad to. My father was quick to tell Danny that I am a poet. Danny then extended the invitation for me to “keep in touch” and “stop by the gallery anytime.” I took him at his word and attended many of the exhibits and performance shows Danny organized, which people, including myself, have grown to love and appreciate him for.
Born Daniel Simmons in Queens, NY, reading, writing and creative expression were equally valued in the Simmons household. “Our family encouraged creativity and thinking outside of the box. My grandmother went to New York University, my parents were college graduates. I come from a second generation of college educated Blacks so literature and art was always a part of our lives,” he says. Danny’s mother, a schoolteacher, often brought home art supplies and painted in their home. His father, a school administrator and teacher of Black history at Pace University also wrote poetry. “My father introduced me to the poets of the Harlem Renaissance, this tied into his experience as a civil rights activist.” Danny also recalls, “There’s a little known fact that my father wrote several of Run-D.M.C.’s songs.” Poetry had a strong affect on Danny as a teenager, when he began listening to The Last Poets, a group of performing poets whose work was and still is aimed at uplifting the black community. “The music, the drums and rhythms did something that was really revolutionary at that time,” Danny says.
Although Danny maintained his love for poetry, “My favorite poets through the years became Allen Ginsburg, Amiri Baraka, Sonia Sanchez and many of the beat poets of the 60’s. Spoken word adds another layer when you add rhythm, movement and intonation,” Danny began painting in his late twenties when faced with writer’s block upon completing his first novel. Both a writer and painter at heart, Danny realized that painting gave him more of a sense of immediate accomplishment. “I made a decision to express myself creatively through painting first. After you read a book it may take you two weeks to figure out how it affected you, how you liked it. Looking at a painting is so much more immediate, you connect to it right away.”
Educated at New York University and Long Island University in Social Work, Danny did not pursue formal training in art. He felt being recognized as a painter would make it easier for him to later introduce his written work to the masses. Danny is an avid collector whose home features several rooms adorned with priceless African artifacts, and the work of hundreds of painters, sculptors and photographers from both here and abroad. His Corridor Gallery is a community-based gallery serving Brooklyn residents and artists, with a primary focus on artists and audience development. The Corridor Gallery presents five exhibitions each year.
Through his years as a painter Danny has been conscious of holding onto his vision to become a respected published writer. Danny’s recent book of poetry, I Dreamed My People Were Calling But I Couldn’t Find My Way Home (Moore Black Press, January 2007) is a visually stunning, coffee table-style paperback, merging Danny’s insightful, haunting, and truth telling poetry, with the bright colors and bold patterns of his paintings. As you turn the pages and view his work, the words and images seem to reach out to you, wrapping around your senses.
I stand alone in rampant words
coiled viper prison and loose shoes irritation
The beating of
drums from
far to distant shores
elusive and dangerous memory calling burnt skin
sons and daughters to warrior abandoned mini-bus
pow-wow
Danny’s 2003 novel, Three Days as the Crow Flies (Atria Books) introduced protagonist Crow Shade as a hustler from Brooklyn who steals paintings from a friend and plans to hock the work as his own on the streets of Manhattan. Crow gets caught up in a series of lies, which result in his being heralded as the next big thing on the Lower East Side art scene.
Danny recently closed a deal with Simon & Schuster to turn Three Days as the Crow Flies into an 80-page graphic novel to be released February 2008. The novel has been adapted by both Danny and Floyd Hughes, a comic book artist who is also the illustrator. Malaika Adero, Senior Editor at Atria Books says of the forthcoming graphic novel, “It’s Danny’s concept and it’s a fabulous project and a great story. It’s a story inspired by the art world in New York in the 80s, and the drug culture that was a part of that generation. It is in part, a cautionary tale of when the good times can go awry. This brings together Danny’s sensibilities as a visual artist and a literary artist. Danny has always tapped into the cultural pulse.”
Danny’s novel was followed by the anthology Def Poetry Jam on Broadway (Atria Books) edited by Danny, and published to ride the wave of the long-running and successful Broadway show featuring poets: Suheir Hammad, Georgia Me, Poetri, Beau Sia, Mayda Del Valle, Black Ice, Staceyann Chin, Lemon and Steve Coleman.
When asked how he perceives and manages the process of being both poet and painter, Danny replies, “The only thing that has changed is that my writing is in a public forum. My poetry is mostly about where we find ourselves in the world and in relationships. But I am still very much a painter. Painting has been more freeing for me than writing poetry. Painting is more of a direct conduit from my spirit, connecting me to my ancestors. While I think poetry is more of an intellectual process for me.”
As a community leader, philanthropist, and producer, Danny uses his time, real estate and position as a respected artist to support the growth of other artists while serving the greater community. When spoken word poetry was still considered a novelty by some, Danny offered up his Manhattan and Brooklyn gallery space for artists to shine and polish their performance craft. “It’s all interrelated. It’s all about bringing art to the people,” he says. “For me, it’s all symbiotic. The bottom line is creating healing art for the community. If I have the ability to provide a forum, safe space, or educational setting then I do so, to create opportunities for others. Creativity should be nurtured with no strings attached.” The mega-successful HBO Def Poetry Jam came out of those poetry gatherings at his galleries, and his lifelong love for the art. Danny asserts that Def Poetry Jam has done several things: “It brought poetry to the places it wasn’t, made the art form more respected. But at the same time it sort of killed it for the people who originated it, made it less hip, less edgy, less underground.”
Rush Philanthropic Arts Foundation, founded by Danny and his brothers, brings the arts to New York City schools and funds many programs for youth. “We support every art form, not just visual arts. It’s about engaging the kids. We fund the whole realm of the arts: dance, poetry, photography and visual,” says Danny. Rush Philanthropic also funds the poetry program Urban Word NYC. Rush Philanthropic built art galleries for P.S. 11 in Manhattan and P.S. 371 in Brooklyn, and provides programs for both schools. Corridor Gallery serves as the base for the education programs of Rush Philanthropic.
Danny is in the process of opening a new arts center in Brooklyn, Rush Arts East New York, which will “house artist studios, an art gallery and space for teaching artists,” says Danny. He is the curator of several upcoming art exhibitions and has produced the Big Black Madonna exhibition at MoCADA (Museum of Contemporary Diasporan Art).
The world surrounding Danny Simmons has fully embraced him and his artistic contributions. His people called and he in turn, answered. “Being in a position to help someone other than yourself is what it’s all about,” he says. “You have to make this world a better place than how you found it.” And so he has.