How does someone become an artist when they hadn’t been drawing instinctively

from an early age? In the case of Ron Parker, it was simply a matter of self-

preservation. Wildlife became so familiar to him while on nature walks with his

son that they pressed the issue. "When the animals started crawling up my leg,"

he says, "I started painting them."

There were hints of his fine art career in his early life, but they weren’t

overwhelmingly obvious. He was born and raised amongst the beauty of British

Columbia, but graduated from Lord Byng High School in Vancouver without a set

career path. "My college career," he says, "was eclectic."

Parker knew that fine art was a true calling when he found himself approaching

the subject with a dedication he had not experienced and the animals around his

home started getting familiar. Each year for the next ten years he devoted

himself to a different artistic challenge—light, composition, design, etc.

When the ten years were done Parker’s career as a fine artist was well on its

way, impressing collectors with more than a dozen one-man shows across the

continent. He was named "Artist of the Year" for the 1994 Vancouver

International Wildlife Art Show, was commissioned by the Royal Canadian Mint to

create sea otter images that would appear on coins and his paintings have been

repeatedly selected for the prestigious Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum’s

exhibitions.