Brendan Parker was born in Chicago and spent his formative years overseas. In 1989 he moved to NYC to pursue a career in the arts, for the next decade he worked in ceramics. In 2000 he began working in digital photography. Since then, Brendan's images have been exhibited at the HereArt Gallery in New York, NY, the Cooperstown Art Association in Cooperstown, NY, and the Provincetown Art Association in Provincetown, MA. His photographs are in private collections worldwide.
These images are essentially journal entries from a series of relationships. They imply intimacy, unscripted and unrehearsed. They allude to a time and place that may not exist, except in the artist’s imagination.
I like the images because they are raw and spontaneous. They don’t attempt to mimic other media; they exploit idiosyncrasies of digital photography – synthetic focus, distortion, and fragmentation – to illuminate the human experience. To that end they are successful.
Currently, I am developing a new project entitled “Not So Hummel” that explores unconscious desire and adolescence. It is based on a collection of Hummel reproductions. As craftsmen emulated the originals, or reproductions of reproductions, the figurines were altered. The deconstruction of Hummel figurines raises questions. What is it about tussled hair, flower blossoms, and umbrellas that have universal appeal? Why are people drawn to figurines, and their facsimiles, that were inspired by a German nun’s sketches and pastel drawing created during the Nazi era? Can reproductions reveal more than the original artifacts? What can these figurines tell us about adolescence and sexual identity? |