Cold day by Daniel Abera
Explore Mondoir Studio
Medium: Acrylic , marker and collage on canvas
Dimensions: 90 x 100 cm
Year: 2026
Price: $2400.00 USD
Status: available
“Cold Day” grew from my memory of markets that remain alive even when the air turns sharp and the sky feels distant. I wanted to honor the quiet resilience of the people who gather there, carrying warmth through fabric, conversation, work, and daily ritual. At the center, a seated figure pauses beside a lantern and kettle, creating a small sanctuary within the movement of the street. I built the scene with acrylic, marker, and collage, allowing each material to echo the layered character of market life. Cool blues rise through the buildings and open sky, holding the chill of the day, while vivid greens, patterned garments, and touches of yellow bring human warmth into the composition. The drawn lines, stacked objects, hanging cloth, and repeated figures create a rhythm that feels both busy and intimate, like many individual stories unfolding at once. I hope this work offers the feeling of standing at the edge of that market, observing without intrusion. Beneath the cold, there is tenderness, dignity, and connection. For me, the painting is a reminder that warmth is not only found in weather, but in the spaces people create for one another.
Why collect this work?
Cold day makes the market’s social density legible through compression: upright figures, hanging lines and stacked goods fill the scene, while a seated figure establishes a slower foreground interval.
- Abera’s statement identifies the marketplace as a site of memory, identity and collective experience. In this work, that interest takes form through repeated bodies, patterned clothing and ordinary wares rather than an expansive city view.
- In the photograph, tall figures overlap blue building shapes, with merchandise arranged in narrow horizontal tiers. The seated figure’s red-and-white patterned back forms the largest single shape, visually linking the nearby kettle and lantern to the busier stalls beyond.
- The catalogue records acrylic, marker and collage on canvas. Marker permits wiry contours across painted passages, while the combined media might support the sharp changes between flat pattern, loose colour and linear description visible here.
- Dated 2026 and measuring 90 by 100 cm, the work supports discussion of how markets organize both labour and temporary rest. Its packed structure makes stillness appear as part of collective activity, not an escape from it.
About the Artist
Daniel Abera
Daniel Abera is an artist on Mondoir Studio. Artistic discipline: Mixed media painting. Based in Addis ababa, ET.
Nationality: Ethiopian
My practice explores memory, identity, and collective experience through everyday environments and objects.
