Artist:David Welker
Size:13” x 16”
Colors:5/0
Paper:Neenah Stardream Opal
Edition:200 
Purchase:Sold Out

“I've always been fascinated with Rural America, Appalachia, and the ominous beauty of the post industrial "Rust Belt" region. My family had Midwest roots after immigrating mostly from Scotland in the early 19th Century. My Grandmother from a poor coal mining family in Alabama moved North and met a wealthy son of a publishing family just West of Cleveland, Ohio. Our family travels through Western Pennsylvania and Ohio are forever etched in my memories, as are the sensibilities of that rural mindset.

For this latest piece titled "The Mill Road" I worked in cooperation with Coal Camp USA and Rust Belt journalist Chris DellaMea. Originally a part of some research for a concert poster for "The Decemberists" playing in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania in 2011, at the time I changed gears and chose a more stylized depiction of "Steel Town" for the final poster. So all these years later I decided to rework the old sketch I had started back then. And having lost the original photo, I finished it from memory.

I think there is some extra charm in the piece having waited for so many years and with the subtle interpretations of memory.

Now my good friends at The Half & Half in South Carolina have made a beautiful screen print edition on an Opal Pearlescent paper and we will also have a beautifully hand-deckled giclee edition as well.” - David Welker