Education
- Ph.D., Texas Tech University
- M.F.A., The University of Texas at Austin
- B.F.A. with Honors, The University of Texas at Austin
Areas of Expertise
Welter's specialties are painting, art criticism and higher education curriculum development.
Previous Experience
Welter joined JMU as director of the School of Art and Art History after having previously served as chair of the Department of Art at the University of Alaska Anchorage. He has also taught at Texas Tech University, the University of Texas at Austin and owned a Madison Avenue design firm in New York City after having worked as a senior designer and art director for Macmillan and Random House publishing companies.
Scholarship
Welter has exhibited critically acclaimed paintings at a variety of national and international venues for more than four decades. Past exhibition sites include galleries and museums in Houston, New York, Seattle and Chicago as well as invited shows in Canada, Japan and Russia. His published work includes Art and Computers: Is there Room in the Studio for Both? and Technological Segregation: A Peek through the Looking Glass at the Rich and Poor in an Information Age. His artwork is on display in several permanent public collections.
Professional Affiliations
Welter is a past member of the Accrediting Commission for Community and Pre-collegiate Arts Schools and the National Association of Schools of Art and Design Commission on Accreditation. He has served as an elected member of the Executive Board of the National Council of Arts Administrators and as Administrative Vice President for the Shenandoah Council for the Arts.
He is a current or past member of the College Art Association, Southeastern College Art Conference, the National Art Education Association, the American Film Institute, the Alaska Education Research Association, and the art education associations of Texas, Alaska and Virginia. He is a life member of the Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi and the University of Texas at Austin Alumni Association.
Honors and Awards
Welter has received grants and fellowships for his creative and scholarly work from numerous artistic and philanthropic organizations including the Ford Foundation, the Getty Center for Education in the Arts, the National Endowment of the Arts, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Virginia Commission for the Arts, the Alaska Arts Commission, and the Arts Council of the Valley.
Welter is listed in Who's Who in American Art, Who's Who in the West and South, and Who's Who Among American Teachers. He was the first recipient of Texas Tech University’s Distinguished Art Alumni Award (1991), and received the Reston Prize in Writing (second place) from in the National Associations of Art, Music, Theater and Dance (1987).
He has been twice selected as the Alaska Higher Art Educator of the year (1990, 1992) and was nominated for the University of Alaska Anchorage Chancellor's Award for Excellence (1995) and the JMU Outstanding Graduate Advisor Award (2011).
Service
Welter regularly juries regional and national arts events, such as the national Scholastic Art Awards program in New York City and as a project grant evaluator for the Virginia Commission for the Arts. He is an accreditation reviewer and consultant for the National Association of Schools of Art and Design and was a selected representative at the Pacific Region NAEA Leadership Institute.
He has served on the Executive Board of Directors for the Anchorage Museum of History and Art and as Executive Vice President of the Shenandoah Council for the Arts.
Past university committee assignments include appointments to the University of Alaska Anchorage General Education Task Force and work to initiate the University of Alaska Anchorage's chapter of Phi Kappa Phi.
At present he serves on the JMU Graduate Advisory Council and JMU’s Committee on Academic Programs. Welter has served more than 15 years as the faculty advisor to the JMU Chapter of Kappa Pi, an arts honor fraternity, and chairs the JMU College of Visual and Performing Arts Committee on Curriculum and Instruction. Welter also serves as the graduate program director and faculty senator for the JMU School of Art, Design and Art History.
