Grateful Dead On The Road - 1978

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This piece is signed by both Mouse and Alton Kelley, who passed away in 2008, such that the value of this piece will only increase. Created to promote the Dead’s 1978 tours, this poster features the classic skull and roses image at center with some stylized "GD" initials below and "On The Road" in text. This image was also used in 1979 as the original cover art for the first Grateful Dead songbook, called Grateful Dead Anthology, and later in 1997 for Grateful Dead Anthology II.

Stanley Mouse designed with Art Nouveau elegance and American pop-art sensibilities. He produced posters for the Fillmore Auditorium and the Avalon Ballroom. Art and music came together in images associated with the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin, Big Brother and the Holding Company, Steve Miller, and later Journey, and he Rolling Stones. Mouse and Kelley did the first eight album covers for the Grateful Dead.

As a founding member of the Family Dog, Alton Kelley handled promotions for events at the Avalon. He soon met Stanley Mouse, and their association nurtured Kelley's success as an artist. Kelley had a natural talent for collage and a keen eye for culling and combining imagery and styles from diverse sources. Teamed with Mouse's drafting skill, collaborations became increasingly sophisticated, yet irreverent. Kelley always worked by hand, producing posters and other print graphics for a wide array of entertainment-oriented clients.