David "Big Dutch Nally" stands with his artwork. PHOTOS BY WES CIPOLLA
Originally published in the Pottsville Republican-Herald on August 12, 2022.
SCHUYLKILL HAVEN — David “Big Dutch” Nally can’t remember how he got the nickname, but he knows it came from his coworkers at the Reading steel mill where he worked until his retirement in 2016. Around the time he started working there, he began exhibiting his drawings and paintings, which are now in the Reading Public Museum and multiple private collections.
“It’s who I am,” Nally said. “Something I’ve always done is make art.”
“Rainbows and Garbage Dumps,” an exhibition of Nally’s art, is on display now until Sept. 4 at Cabin Contemporary gallery, 357 Manheim Road. The art being shown is up for sale, with prices ranging from $250 to $5,000.
“Life is kind of good and bad,” Nally said, explaining the exhibition’s title. “You might find a pot of gold, and then the next day you lose it.”
Cabin Contemporary, which opened in June, is a small white shed on the property of local artist Lance Rautzhan.
“We have man caves, she sheds and now art galleries in your backyard,” Nally said. “Why didn’t we think of this? This is the hottest art show I’ve ever been to, and I’ve worked in a steel mill for 30 years, so now people can finally understand my art. My mind was warmed in the heat.”
Nally was born in Reading, but often visited Schuylkill County in his youth to look for fossils. His grandfather worked at Eagle Hill Colliery in Blythe Twp. He calls his blue-collar upbringing, which appears in his art in the form of smoke-spewing and abandoned factories, “anachronistic,” a symbol of a disappearing era.
“Culture changes,” he said. “These are some of the upheavals we’re having right now.”
Nally said he has loved to draw since he was a child but has no formal training — the steel mill is where he got his education.
“In a sense, I’m an outsider of the art world,” he said, “because I didn’t come up in the normal art world. I never went to art school. Anyone can do art.”
His style is meticulous chaos, featuring repetitive iconic images of modern America. He combines little steepled churches, rows of identical houses and supernatural figures with sardonic, politically-charged captions like “When Moses parted the waters it laid the groundwork for developers to build another MacDonalds.(sic)”
A closer look at Nally's artwork.
McDonald’s appears frequently in Nally’s work, a side effect of viewing “14 trillion” McDonald’s commercials during his childhood.
“I’m irritating culture because I’m regurgitating it,” he said. “They filled me up with it, and now it’s coming out.”
His colorful scribbles, religious iconography and meaningful use of text are reminiscent of 20th-century artists like Cy Twombly and Jean-Michel Basquiat.
“It’s more or less a dialogue with the viewer,” he said, “where the viewer can assess their life and their situation up against these drawings, bounce their own ideas and thoughts about our culture. There’s no one answer to those drawings.”
He starts with an idea, usually about “everyday culture and life,” and takes it from there. On his canvas, it becomes a highly-detailed meditation on religion, politics and the mass media.
“I just have more of a clear conscience of what I believe and what I disbelieve,” he said. “It’s the biggest things that people think about. God and death and you know, all the big and small things, they all count.”
“I was really surprised, honestly,” said Josh Iverson of Pottsville. “I didn’t know what to expect. I think it’s a really interesting contemporary perspective on what’s going on, but there’s also a lot of playfulness there. It reminded me of notebook doodles when you’re in high school.”
Cabin Contemporary is open by appointment only. Appointments can be made by emailing cabincontemporary@gmail.com.
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