David Walinski

David Walinsky is reentering the arts community after his retirement enabled him to focus on his work. His new work highlights his interest in urban realism.

Life in an urban environment tends to dull the senses, especially if we travel to work by the same route every day. The same stores, the same restaurants, the same office buildings, the same traffic lights all tend to blur together as we hurry to our cubicles. We pay little attention to the scenes outside our car windows.

But if we walk to work rather than take a car, a whole new world opens up. We’re forced to look at cracks in the sidewalk or broken asphalt. We look at traffic signals and wonder why they need so many wires. On the expressway you won’t notice dandelions popping up from crevices in the middle of all that gray.

Manhole covers are a world of beauty that few of us ever pay attention to. Mimi Melnick once declared Louisville’s to be the most beautiful in the nation. But as I was painting, they began taking on a different look, like small planets surrounded by galaxies full of concrete stars and comets. A whole universe opened up where before there was only metal and concrete.

Manhole covers aren’t just for protecting sewer pipes and utility lines: they can brighten up our humdrum lives as well.