Artist David Thurston Darling was born in New York City on November 18, 1891, the eldest of two sons born to Charles and Emma (nee Thurston) Darling. The painter, muralist, printmaker, book illustrator, and teacher has very little documentation of his life or career, though certain major events have been recorded on online.

From 1917 to 1919 Darling served in the First World War as a part of the U.S. Army's 488th Aero Squadron in France, before returning to the U.S. and setting in Canadaigua, Ontario, New York. Darling appears to have never formally studied art in the U.S. However, after marrying artist Mollie Shuger in 1922, the newlyweds went abroad to study in France, first in Nice and then in Paris at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière and the Académie Colarossi. They had two children, Joseph (b. France 1925, d. New York in 1929), and Erik (1934-2008) who would become a noted folk musician. David Darling would eventually open his own paint store, which he operated until his death on October 6, 1958, in Canahaigua.

Darling's works were exhibited in the Salon des Beaux Arts in Paris, the Memorial Art Gallery, University of Rochester, New York, the Corcoron Gallery in Washington, D.C. (1932), and elsewhere. During World War II he was again drafted into service though he was by then in his 50s and likely served in a non-combat role. He eventually moved to 46 Washington Square in Manhattan.

Darling is known for developing a technique he called "water-graph." Similar to pochoir, he accomplished this technique by using as many as eight stencils to obtain the outlines of an image and then applied watercolor with a dry brush to create ethereal gradations of color. In 1935, Darling illustrated Dorothy Berliner Commins’ Making an Orchestra. It has been written that he was an Assistant Professor of Art at Marshall College in Huntington, West Virginia after 1930.