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In just a short period of time, Micah Parker has become recognized
as a leading ketubah artist with fresh, stunning designs that are unlike any
others on the market. His modern interpretation of this traditional art form
is being welcomed by today's generation of brides and grooms around the world.
One of his ketubah designs, Renaissance, is featured in the Associated
American Jewish Museum's traveling exhibition of ketubot, and his work was chosen
by a national search firm to be featured on the front cover of a 5760 Hebrew
calendar. His artwork has also been featured in several publications and on television
during TLC’s A Wedding Story.
Micah is originally from Middletown, Ohio. There, he began his
endeavors as an artist at the age of three. He moved with his family to Austin,
Texas in the early 1980s, where his high school created a new art program to
accommodate his desire to learn and the skill he exhibited with acrylics, colored
pencils and pastels. As he completed his art education, he was eager to begin
his career as an artist. However, at his parents' request, he entered the family
manufacturing business. He worked there for 13 years, working his way up from
installer to vice president.
After a long hiatus from the art world, he grew anxious to draw
and paint again. He had also developed skills in the use of a new medium while
working in his parents' business -- computer graphics. In his spare time, he
began creating artwork on the computer. Although Micah was not satisfied with
creating art on a part-time basis, he had no plans, at that point, to turn his
endeavors into a business, particularly given the difficulties in leaving his
family's firm.
At the urging of friends, Micah began to create ketubot and other
Judaic art. After several years of producing custom ketubot for couples in Austin
and life-cycle certificates for his synagogue, he left his parents' business
and began marketing his ketubot and Judaica nationally.
Micah now lives and creates his artwork in Sarasota, Florida with
the inspiration of his wife, Mindy, and under the constant scrutiny and curiosity
of their cats, Matisse, Monet, Seuss and Pollock.
About the Art –
As Jews have been spread throughout the Diaspora over the course
of history, they have tended to adopt some of the regional traditions, languages
and customs as their own. Micah incorporates this "borrowing" concept
into his work by combining historical, ornamental art and architectural design
with Jewish symbolism to create colorful and distinctively Jewish art. His designs
tend to reflect his love for the rich patterns so often seen in the architecture
and art of various cultures.
Although he is an accomplished fine artist in several traditional
mediums, Micah creates all of his ketubot and Judaica on the computer. This is
not as easy it may sound. Digital art, like any other medium, has its benefits
and its drawbacks. There have been many instances when he has been overheard
saying, "This would be a lot easier to just draw it by hand." The images
Micah creates are produced in much the same way he would create them using traditional
fine art media -- but with far less clean up! All of the artistic knowledge about
light, color, composition and more that are required to paint a masterpiece in
oil are required to produce one in digital art.
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