Parmalee Cover

Beauty Parlor Assistant
digital photography iPhone, laser print on core
16 x 16 in.

This collage painting is about Helen, my BFF since High School where she known as having a “bad reputation. This label plagued her – as other loud hilarious inappropriate women – through her often unrequited life. Nonetheless, Helen was conventionally good housekeeper and wife who loved cats and cute things. I always loved and admired her. I miss her.

I’ve been involved with interdisciplinary arts forever. (media, writing, painting and photography, you name it, I’ll try it.) Now at 83 I hasten to snag the bitter sweet of the world around me in iphone shots many of which I use as components for large format collage paintings that tell universal narratives. Through my large paintings, I expand upon complexities lessons gleaned from the lives of people I encounter.

I have been emersed in classic illustration, San Francisco figurative movement, independent filmmaking, experimental photography and writing, performance poetry, television production. and video art. I have combined each of these areas in my 40 years of teaching on all levels. Then there’s social protest. I need to call out abuse doled out to women and children.

© Parmalee Cover