Rising Stars: Meet Sharron Parker

Today we’d like to introduce you to Sharron Parker.

Hi Sharron, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
When I was growing up in Florida, I loved coming to the North Carolina mountains for a week or two of summer camp; it was cooler, had rugged but lovely scenery, and some great old stone buildings. So I chose to come to NC for college, where I studied art, education, and interior design.

After college, I took regular jobs — teaching, working in a shop — just doing art in my spare time. But a weekend in the mountains took me to Penland School of Crafts, where there was one space left in a two-month-long weaving class. It seemed like fate, since I was between jobs, having just moved to Raleigh.

Spending that time with the artists/craftsmen at Penland made us want to be a fiber artist full time. But I knew the reality was that I could not expect fiber art to offer much in the way of income; my husband and I would have to live a simple lifestyle, and I would need to work hard just to pay the expenses of a studio. So began my career as an artist.

I knew I wanted to work with textiles, and at first, I wove pillows, scarves, etc. which I knew I could sell in galleries and craft fairs. But I also took part-time jobs, for added income. Then in 1980, I saw handmade felt — the oldest textile technique, dating to the Stone Age — for the first time. Almost nobody was working in that medium, but I decided it was what I wanted to do. And it is what I have done now, for more than 40 years.

Now that I am much older, I can tell you that following my heart, in doing something a little weird and crazy, has a happy ending. In a couple of months, I will have a show of my handmade felt wall pieces and teach a workshop, in an old textile mill in a medieval village in France.

I will get to see lots more old stone buildings, cave paintings (which go with my Neolithic textile technique), and travel through areas as beautiful as the NC mountains.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
I knew that most fiber artists didn’t earn much, and I was no exception. But I had a wonderful husband, who had a regular job, and we kept our lifestyle simple, so being an artist was possible.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I do handmade felt wall pieces, sometimes quite large, and often with a lot of color and texture.

Few artists are working in this medium, and I have developed techniques that make my work quite unique, I think.

It has been a pleasure to exhibit it throughout the U.S., and with the Art in Embassies program, in Turkmenistan and Armenia.

Networking and finding a mentor can have such a positive impact on one’s life and career. Any advice?
Joining groups of other artists, taking classes and workshops, and generally participating in lots of art events, is helpful.

Contact Info:

• Email: sharron@sharronparker.com
• Website: www.SharronParker.com
• Instagram: @Duchess1nc
• Facebook: Sharron Parker / Handmade Felt