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Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth Opens Focus: Erik Parker

The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth has opened Focus: Erik Parker, on view December 5, 2010–February 6, 2011.

Erik Parker has described his work as “fragmented samples of our culture.” His complex fantasy portraits elicit the poignant, melancholy, grotesque, psychological, provocative, and almost always comical and surreal, baggage of our time.

Swirls of pinks, blues, yellows, oranges, purples, and whites make up his meandering images. The subjects are often set against a black background, accompanied by a word or phrase nestled somewhere in the lower half of the canvas. Suggestive titles such as Half Made Man, Player Hater, Betty Fords, Drama, Crime, Hoax, Why Me, Think Twice, and American Apparel, for example, seem to label and supplement the state of each sitter. The words, when juxtaposed with the portraits, clearly speak to the present day. At the same time, the imagery calls to mind the elaborate inner workings of humanity in general.

Erik Parker lives in Brooklyn, New York. Born in 1968 in Stuttgart, Germany, Parker grew up in San Antonio, Texas. He received a BFA in 1996 from the University of Texas at Austin and earned his MFA at SUNY Purchase in 1998. His work has been shown internationally in both solo and group exhibitions.

Image: Erik Parker, Think Twice, 2007. Acrylic and enamel on canvas, 52 x 42 inches.

Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth
3200 Darnell Street
Fort Worth, Texas 76107
Telephone 817.738.9215
Toll Free 1.866.824.5566
www.themodern.org

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