Born in 1952, the fourth child of a minister, David L. Simmons spent his first two years in Birmingham, Alabama. Then the family moved to Magnolia Springs, Alabama on the Gulf Coast, a place the family had visited many times even before his birth. At this early age, a strong affection was born for the sandy soil, long-leaf pines, and hot, salty summer breezes of coastal Alabama. Between the age of seven and twelve he moved with his family to Shreveport, LA and Richmond, VA, but then returned home to south Alabama and has never left.After spending 5 years working his way through college, he graduated from the University of South Alabama in 1977 with a Bachelors of Fine Arts degree with concentrations in studio painting and printmaking. During that time he won a scholarship from the Mobile Art Patrons League. After working months on his Pre-Thesis and Senior Thesis show, while being advised by Dr. James Kennedy, David McCann and Lee Hoffman, he was awarded an unanimous “A” by the Thesis Committee. Since college, Simmons has worked in many mediums including painting, colored-pencil, mixed-media, cast-paper, papermaking, book-binding, sculpture, and even designing and building furniture. For many he is best known for his masterful serigraphs with as many as 140 colors; one of only a few to use the “relief print transfer” method in his work. He is also known for his cast-paper reliefs developed by the artist and called “Mixoglyphs” to represent this unique new medium.