A Brief Look: The Classic Fantasy of Michael Parkes

 

American artist Michael Parkes has reached an interesting state of existence — his work is immediately recognizable, with the fantasies he’s created moving over decades from his canvas into galleries into the frames of box store art aisles. He’s a master painter with mass appeal. An artist financially free to explore all manner of materials, from paint to bronze and beyond.

The women that Parkes imagines are beautiful beyond belief. Organic and mythic. Designed with an inner strength that frees them of any specific time or era. Parkes has crafted a bloodline of divine angels, Roman nosed and buck-lipped. In their other-worldly court are dwarves and a bevy of animals, real and fabled.

The paintings and sculptures of Parkes are available only in the realm of art brokers and dealers, but a few books exist to hunt down and take in.