Parker

Originally hailing from Kununurra in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, but now based out of Tasmania Parker is an artists who thrives on expressing herself though a range of mediums. These mediums range from music, both with her solo project Parker or band project Runaway Belles, and visual art projects. Ultimately though for Tash Parker the art form is irrelevant, it is simply about expression.

Throughout her life Parker has used her surroundings as inspiration for her art. Hence why she has found such a strong connection with her home town in Western Australia and adopted home in Tasmania.

“The quietness and the spaciousness definitely allows for a lot of contemplation and opportunity to have time to be creative,” Parker told City Hub before continuing. “Being able to walk around in nature and be inspired by the organic sounds and landscapes is definitely part of the way I make my music… I’m a visual artist with a very synesthetic response, so with music it’s nice to go for a walk and experience the wind or atmosphere and try to translate that into sounds.”

Not only is Tasmania inspirational to from an environmental perspective but Parker also explained that it is a place which fosters creativity on a community level, “Tasmania is the place that artists go to be able to afford land and live an artistic lifestyle. A lot of artists from all over the world have retired here. It’s quite an eclectic and rich community. It’s very small and very one keeps to themselves, so it takes a while to discover people but it’s definitely supportive of the arts.”

As an artist Parker finds she needs to explore a range of mediums to express herself. This realisation came after becoming burnt out pursing music exclusively.

“I got burnt out from music a few years back, and that was when I started studying visual arts,” explained Parker. “I’ve really realised that one, I am an artists because I’m not good at anything else. And two, it’s nice to be able to express a vast number of emotions and ideas across different mediums, because some mediums are better for certain things than others.”

With her multitude of creative outlets and a community which encourages creative expression forming a foundation around her Parker is able to simply spend time creating in the moment without definitive goals in mind. After that is complete she is then able to categorise the output and assign it to the most fitting project in her arsenal.

“Sometimes I don’t know what is going to come out. So I like to just create whatever is happening on the day and from there I go through all of those things and decide where they fit.”

Her latest release under the Parker moniker, Superhuman, sees her releasing all of the emotions she felt following a “tough separation” which saw her develop insomnia and anxiety for the first time in her life.

“I found that when I was waking up in the morning my heart would be pounding in my chest and I would have this real fight or flight response. The only way to combat that feeling would be to get up, put my running shoes on and run for 30 minute to an hour,” Parker said. “Consequently I got really fit during that time and the process made me realise that it was this amazing thing where I felt broken but was becoming a lot stronger.”

Jul 2 & 16. Parker Live-streaming Concerts. Info: www.facebook.com/iamTashParker