HomeArtists — Ray Allen Parker

Photo by Andrew Kilgore

Meet the Artist

Ray Allen Parker

I believe in heroic paintings — larger-than-life works that explore the human face and figure. I want my portraits to be bold but intimate, dense but revealing. I try to recreate my subjects, not just depict them, in a convincing, painterly way that simultaneously renders paint both as arresting mark and as flesh. Like the painters who have most deeply influenced me — Lucian Freud, Jenny Saville, Odd Nerdrum — I want the painting to feel like the person.

What these portraits can do, I hope, is create a desire to look more closely. The paintings ask us to look beneath the surface of appearances, to peer into the faces of others and experience a panoply of shared and sometimes conflicting emotions and sensations. In this way, my portraits reward our slow looking. I want my works to demand and hold our attention, to reveal new insights about who we are, to connect us to others and to our all-too-human selves.

Biography

Ray Allen Parker is an artist, currently living and working in Fayetteville. Originally from Egypt, Arkansas, he received a B.A. and M.A. in English from the University of Arkansas, where he took his first painting class. Following a three-decade career in retail communications and advertising, he returned to his lifelong interest in portrait and figure painting.

Work

Afrikaner

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She Breathes With Trees

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St. Sara

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Afrikaner

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She Breathes With Trees

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St. Sara

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Features

Event

Drop 002 - Opening Day

Join us on March 3 for a first look and curator-led tour of Drop 002: Natural Beings, MIXD’s second exhibition. ...

Friday, March 3rd — 11:00-6:00pm

Free
Exhibition

Merging Spaces

MIXD Gallery’s inaugural exhibition, Merging Spaces, showcases a vivid assortment of artists working in the Ozark region.

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Event

Merging Spaces

MIXD presents its inaugural exhibition, Merging Spaces, including a sweep of 30 regional artists and artworks with the intent to expand the region’s art market and community.

Saturday, November 19th — 11:00am

Free

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