Daniel Parker (artist)

Daniel Parker
Daniel Parker in 2013
Born	Daniel Ray Parker (1959-11-18)November 18, 1959 Portland, Oregon, US
Residence	Kalispell, Montana
Nationality	United States
Education	Self-taught
Known for	Sculpture, painting
Notable work	Members Only; Yellowstone Legacy; Black Mesa Mulies; The Watcher; Brooks Falls
Movement	Animalier (modern)
Spouse(s)	Jeanne Drollinger
Website	ParkerBronze.com
Patron(s)	Jack Nicklaus; Robert A. Funk

Daniel Ray Parker (born November 18, 1959) is an American wildlife sculptor and painter. Parker has won multiple awards for wildlife sculpture at major art shows in the United States. He is a resident of Kalispell, Montana.

Parker was born on November 18, 1959 in Portland, Oregon. He is the son of Donald Edward "Don" Parker (1938–2015) and Joan Arlue Sievers (born 1939). The Parkers had moved to Portland in early 1959 from Kalispell, Montana, to find work but after less than a year in Oregon they moved back to Kalispell, their home town. Parker's great grandfather, originally from Norridgewock, Maine, had moved to the Flathead Valley in 1905 from Parker, Minnesota, to homestead on a farm on the Flathead River, near Demersville, about five miles south of Kalispell and two miles north of Flathead Lake.

Parker's father, who by 1963 was an aspiring country western singer and guitarist, met a woman nearly twice his age in a Kalispell night club and decided to eschew his marital and parental responsibilities by leaving town with her—abandoning his family—and headed for California where he thought he would become a famous musician but instead took construction work building a tunnel. After moving to Hendersonville, Tennessee, in 1966, Don did have some mild success when he toured with Tommy Cash and later recorded a single as the duet "Don & Carla" with 50 States Records, but long-term success would evade him due largely to an affinity for the bottle. The 45 record he recorded was not successful, selling only a few hundred copies. He did, however, succeed as a night club performer and headlined some state fairs in the late 1960s, one such performance being in Missoula, Montana, at the Western Montana Fair, that was rained out. Daniel's mother, Joan, held out hope that Don would return to Kalispell to help raise his children; he never did. Also, he never provided any child support or alimony, so in October 1962 she was granted a divorce on the ground of "extreme cruelty". Daniel and his siblings grew up destitute, having been raised by a single mother and family on welfare who had been abandoned. Daniel's older brother, Mike, would say in 2015 after the death of their father, "unfortunately, he was only a sperm donor and nothing more". In the first 20 years of their lives, the Parker children would see their biological father twice, on each occasion for just a few hours.