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Curt Parker
CFA, AFC
Wildlife and Pets in Acrylics on Canvas |
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As a child I loved to draw, so my parents kept paper and pencil available to occupy me in those years before television. I also loved to draw because my father was an exceptional pencil artist and woodcarver, and I strove to be as good as dad. In those days I wasn’t his equal, but I kept trying. In high school I took art classes and was fortunate to have a good teacher, Jeanne Yoder, who taught classic techniques and color theory.
Unfortunately, I decided to forego formal art education in college, although I did continue to draw and paint on my own. However, this consigned me to being a “self-taught artist,” which may sound romantic, but in reality it translated into years of trial and error. If I could live my life over, by hook or crook I would go the best art school available and speed the process of learning mediums and techniques.
During my twenties and early thirties, I taught English in public schools to put bread on the table, as I continued to study the great painters from Rembrandt and Picasso to Franz Kline and Andrew Wyeth. I never quit drawing and painting, and produced portraits, still life, and abstracts. But when I did my first animal portrait in the early 1970s, something clicked into place. After a trip to the St. Louis Zoo, I painted a male African lion in a simple, monochromatic portrait. People liked it as much as I did, and the lion became the most memorable piece in my first one-man exhibit at the Harmon Gallery of St. Louis in 1972.
By the late 1970s, I traded the classroom for the studio and endeavored to be a full-time, fine artist. I held exhibits, including one at the Busch Memorial Center of St. Louis University in 1977. That exhibit led to private commissions by several art collectors that kept me afloat. I also began a productive relationship with the Merrill Chase Galleries of Chicago. But many hard lessons about galleries loomed ahead.
As most artists experience, all this activity didn’t pay the bills. Nearly broke, I got a job at a newspaper selling ads and writing features. But again, I never gave up my art. In 1980, I produced my first limited edition print and sold it to galleries around the U.S. and Canada. But due to my immaturity as a “commercial” artist, I grew weary of the daily marketing gyrations one must endure in the retail market. Even though I was hitting singles and doubles and should have realized that success is usually measured in small victories, in my mind I should have been slamming home runs and becoming nationally recognized. For a brief time, I hooked up with an agent but that didn’t work out, and I became discouraged after several of my paintings and prints were stolen from or lost by galleries and shows. Those losses threw me for a loop and cost me dearly. A gallery in San Francisco closed without informing me, and several thousand dollars of work simply disappeared. I also had one of my zebra images ripped off by an Asian company that reproduced it on cocktail napkins.
Despite some success I was not content with my work. Too inconsistent, I fell into a dry period. But after a divorce, I met the girl of my dreams and life was fun again. Deborah and I have enjoyed over 31 years of marriage, and she has always encouraged my art. During the next two decades, I took advertising jobs to support our growing family (including 3 daughters), all while doing art whenever I could. Over time, my technique improved. I closely followed the work of other animal artists, including Robert Bateman, Robert Kuhn, Edward Aldrich, Dino Paravano, John Banovich, and Carl Brenders, among others. I had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Bateman at two of his exhibits, and I’ve learned a lot from studying his incredible paintings.
I continued to pick up commissions and exhibit in various galleries. I held the largest one-man show of my career at the exclusive Plaza Frontenac in St. Louis in 1980, receiving excellent TV and press coverage. But if there was a defining moment, it was the day I met Marlin Perkins, the world-renowned zoologist and host of the TV program, Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom. He was granted me a private showing in his home. As the result of meeting Marlin, I became involved with one of his major projects, The Wild Canid Survival and Research Center (now known as the Endangered Wolf Center). Situated in a densely wooded tract outside St. Louis, the wolves became a favorite subject on my easel.
In addition to wildlife art, I love painting dogs and cats. In the late 1970s, I was commissioned to paint my first pet portrait, a small painting of a Weimaraner, the famous German sporting breed. This particular dog had died a year or two before the owner hired me, so I had to rely upon a single faded snapshot to create the painting. I remember struggling to replicate the unique warm gray of this breed’s coat. A little nervous not knowing what to expect before the presentation, the owner was so pleased that I realized pet portraits were a very worthy genre and included a long history of great painters since the 18th century. I continue to paint dogs to this day and each commission is a test of my skills because I want the owner to reach out and touch the fur.
In 2001 I undertook a special wildlife painting entitled, “Marlin’s Mexican Grays.” I was running my own ad agency and had little time to paint, but I undertook a 24” x 30” canvas depicting 5 wolves howling in a pack. Based on the photographs I took of Marlin’s original breeding stock at the Sanctuary back in the 1970s, I used thousands of layered brush strokes to create the unique fur of the Mexican wolf. The painting took 5 years to complete, although I did many other paintings during that time. Upon completion in 2007, the Sanctuary created collector prints for use in their fundraising.
Starting in 2008, I expanded my conservation efforts by working with the American Association of Zoo Keepers to raise funds for their Bowling for Rhinos® program, a global effort that has raised over $3 million since the early 1990s. The AAZK commissioned me to create a painting of their famous breeding female, Mawingo, the mother of 8 calves reintroduced into the Northern Rangeland Trust in Kenya. I have also been a contributing artist to the Los Angeles Zoo and
St. Louis Zoo, and enjoyed an association with Safari Club International, which used several of my pieces in their promotions and programs.
After years without doing solo exhibits, in early 2010 I held a one-man show featuring over 40 paintings, drawings, and prints. Held at The Willows Gallery in St. Louis, it was a great personal joy and helped me usher in a new phase of my life as a painter.
These days as a full-time artist, I might spend one day on a black rhino and the very next day on a Doberman. In either case, I am a lucky man because I love painting critters of all kinds. I recently was accepted into the prestigious Artist For Conservation Foundation, and I look forward to helping further the preservation of the world’s endangered species. Please visit my Website www.CurtParkerAnimalArt.com.
I would be remiss without thanking my wife, Deborah, for her patience and kindness all these many years, along with my three beautiful and talented daughters: Rachel, Lacey, and Cassidy. My entire family is a joy beyond words. They are my biggest fans. My father passed in 2000, but my first fan, my dear mother, still offers me unconditional praise. She and dad provided the paper and pencil to a little boy artist in the late 1940s. I’m truly glad they did.
October 2010
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Support for Conservation:
I have been committed to the conservation of natural resources since the early 1970s, particularly involving endangered species like wolves, tigers, and Grevy's Zebras. I have donated my artwork to zoos like the Los Angeles and St. Louis Zoo. I have helped raise money for the preservation of wolves through my association with The Endangered Wolf Center in St. Louis. I was also commissioned by the American Association of Zoo Keepers (AAZK) to paint one of their black rhino breeding females at the Lewa Conservancy in Kenya, East Africa.
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