About Parker

Firstly, to everyone that's met me within the the last thirty years, let me explain the name change.
Thirty years ago I chose the name Becca Parker.
I wasn't comfortable with the name on my passport and I was a musician and adopted (beautifully) but the music business being what it was in that time, I really wanted to find out that I was Jewish. I respected and needed to be part of a community. Turned out - not from Jewish stock. But my name Becca Parker has always felt like home. (I was born: Lara Maria Shepley. I was adopted: Maria Christina Waight. I was married: Maria Christina Dowsett. The name on my passport Maria Christina Dowsett. My brilliant parents were so offended that I chose a different name - leagally - I have stuck with the name they gave me.)
But - I have to ditch the Becca bit right now. Politically - I'm ashamed of what's going on globally. I am not a political creature - I'm just not at all sure about the Palastinian situation. My love and warmth extends to anyone who might need it - I'm a bit ashamed of the Becca bit - so, Hallo - my name is Parker.

Sooo - I ran away from social media years ago. I was - am bpmotorspirit. Fell in love with old engines and if you know me - you know the rest.

But everything went horribly wrong. I lost my licence, (end of the world for a motorsports photographer) and so I lost my mind.

That was ten years ago.
Meanwhile lots of enormous things happened just not car-related.
Lockdown was brilliant. I got to spend a couple of years keeping my folks safe. And I love and like them so that was fun.

After lockdown - WE knew I'd be on parent duty when it became necessary, but they were pretty spry still so I went back to school. I meant to do a degree in glass - Wolverhampton University was offering that and it wasn't too far away from my folks - fabulous! But as I was applying the course closed. So I did Fine Art because we could still play with glass ...

Sooo - this week, 3 years later it's the degree show. I'm probably going to graduate this month.
My brilliant, elegant, fierce, loyal mum died a couple weeks ago, after a year of fighting savage cancer. And so I've been trying/needing to express something.
And I found this (Scroll to the bottom) - this beautiful photograph taken a million years ago by a couple of scientists called... umm can't find their names right this moment (09:30 Saturday 14th June) (My stupid windows laptop gave up - so I'm doing this on my aged MacBook) - anyway , at this very moment my logo is their magnificent photo of a breast cancer cell.

And I was exploring encaustic oil painting - and the capacity of that medium and myself. And mum was so ill. And there was nothing I could do. And so for a few months I searched - and invented ways to do what I saw in my head and my heart.

Encaustic is a crazy-difficult-beautiful process. It's beeswax, damar resin and oil paint. It's alchemy. My house smells of bees. And my garden is ram-packed full of dandelions because bees need food and dandelions are easy to scatter. (It's more intricate than that but we need to feed the bees. xx)

So yeah - Mum died. And I painted cancer. And I am crying writing this but these two paintings are proper joyful. To make lines with encaustic oil medim - above everything you have to keep moving. You have to keep dancing.

Submitting a web presence - a social media existance - I will be graded on. And I know the rules and the expectations and I know, today, I'm not adhering to them.

My work offers a chance to be considered, often to touch and be touched. It gives me the opportunity and freedom to express myself in honesty and purity. It’s also about physically splashing about, feeling freely, making my voice solid, and creating a platform to feel and be seen. I feel so strongly and find ease through painting and making more than with speaking.

Feelings and concepts inspire me, and while not always, at the moment, I am looking inward, possibly more than is healthy for any extended period.

Right now, June 2025, I’m almost overwhelmed by the sensations, both physical and emotional, of my mother’s recent, heartbreaking passing after a slow, savage illness. So everything I create is directly inspired by trying to express this indescribable pain. I found a beautiful photograph of a breast cancer cell, photographed by Bruce Wetzel and Harry Schaefer, released in 1980 by the National Cancer Institute. I turned it into something pretty. In creating it, I found genuine pleasure—a source of joy for my soul and my heart.

My previous lives include being a musician and an auto sports photographer.

After a long break, I’m beginning to crave the camera in my hands again and am working to combine both fine art and photography. I hope to start with a triptych titled The Evidence, composed of Life, Live, and TBC. These will be three large, three-dimensional structures made from hundreds of 4 x 5-inch prints documenting my life lived, my life currently, and what’s still to come. I often remember almost nothing day-to-day, so I’ve always diarised with words, photographs, and recordings. It’s a visceral reminder of a life lived out loud - of everything I want to remember.

The structures are still in the building phase, but for now, these pieces, understated yet meaningful, exist as a piece called Life.