G. Daniel Massad paints still life arrangements of fruit, vegetables, flowers, bowls, buckets, and bottles that convey a powerful sense of psychological energy. Massad often arranges his objects on or around pockmarked stone walls redolent of ruins, some of which have letters or symbols inscribed into them, suggesting meaning or code. Set against black backdrops, illuminated in severe directional light, and meticulously rendered in pastels, the forms in Massad’s work are crisp and their surfaces densely textured. The visual poetry in his compositions is accentuated by titles taken from lines in the artist’s favorite poems; and he lists painters of the Dutch Golden Age, such as Johannes Vermeer and Rembrandt van Rijn, and his former teacher, the ceramicist Toshiku Takaezu, among his greatest influences.