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ARTandtheCITY by Jim Magner
ARTIST PORTRAIT: DENZEL PARKS
I
tâs the eyes. They strike you. Grab your attention. The hands are expressiveâmoving, but never in complete focus: they are not posing or frozen in a clear photographic moment. The body, what you see of it, is an expression of a physical being. Itâs not quite an individual identity, but itâs curiously familiar. More like a personality veneer. You can look at them closely or fleetingly and you get fleeting glances in returnâlooking directly at you or beyond. The eyes are defensively noncommittal, but that is when the connection begins. Itâs a shared feeling. A mood. He says his figures sometimes re-
Enigmatic Purple, 48x36, Mix-Media On Canvas.
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flect his mood, but can also influence it at times. For Denzel Parks, his work is all about the natures that define the human experienceâŚa âconglomerate of moments from day to day life.â He conveys these emotion-filled moments by colorâand, of course, by color contrasts. The obvious contrasts, warm-cool and light-dark grab our attention, but it is the contrasting elements of âsaturationâ and proportion, the effect of large and small color areas, that provide the power. He moves patches of heavy darks and light yellows to create tension or relief. He often includes plants in compositions to establish a more relaxed mood. Denzel is a Detroit native who studied graphic design and art history at Eastern Michigan University. He worked as an independent multimedia designer before turning to painting full time. He has recently joined the I Wish I Were A Poet, 48x36, Mix-Media On Canvas Foundry Gallery and is showing there in February. See: At ideas. Life is a walk in a meadow, tip toeing through the Galleries. the tulips. The cover art for the Hill Rag this Of course, a flash of lightening can be illuminatmonth is a Denzel Parks painting, âWill ing. Occasionally, art and ideas become so enmeshed See Us Through.â as to shake the viewer as nothing else can: Michelangeloâs ceiling of the Sistine Chapel explicates a theolJim Magnerâs Thoughts ogy more than any epistle could ever define or glorion Art fy. The Idea becomes supernatural as human forms A feeling doesnât need an idea, it can simexplode through the heavens with impossible powply be an emotion: alarm or joy and ever and grace. That is true of art of other religions or erything in between. Conversely, an idea social orders. The artists are masters of emotion. doesnât need to be happy or sad, passionBut a lightening flash can also burn and destroy; ate or sorrowful, it can be calculating or art can smother the truth and burn holes though the merely logistical. But when ideas and fabric of a time and place. Some of the best propaemotions come together, sparks can fly. ganda has been devised by the wizards of glorificaLightning can flash. Thunder can boom. tion for the exaltation of a false ideal. Usually, art is just a pleasant thing. Visual arts, music, poetry, and theater can adPretty pictures. You feel goodâŚthere is vance either noble or evil ideas with great subtlety nothing new or threatening in the way of to advance a national identity or with stirring, grip-