We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Parker Milgram a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Parker, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

When I switched majors to interactive media and game development in college, I really threw myself into learning how to draw. I would take my sketchbook everywhere and draw everything I saw, the people, the buildings, the trees. In class, I would sketch teachers posing and classroom ceilings to study gesture and perspective.

In the beginning, most of my sketches looked like incomprehensible scribbles to me. But I had two amazing mentors who I would show my sketchbook to, and they really encouraged me to keep going. Looking back now, I think it would have been impossible for me to understand what was getting in the way of my seeing the world because my brain just hadn’t adjusted yet. It takes time.

Then in my junior year I started a paint sketch book and watched a lot of James Gurney videos trying to teach myself to use gouache and paint en plein air. I think my early sketches from life helped me grow in confidence in terms of how I naturally make marks.

At the same time, I was completing school assignments which were a mixture of board games, films, essays, animations, 3D models, concept paintings, really a wide range of mediums and projects which were very interesting to me. Through courses I got introduced to different types of software like Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere, InDesign and Animate.

Two of the most important courses I ever took were narrative illustration and concept art, where I learned processes to take an idea and turn it into a painting or a book. Things like collecting reference, making thumbnail sketches, and transferring traditional pieces into software to edit digitally. During senior year of college I self-published two books, and I feel those projects really brought my understanding of my artistic process to the next level. Since graduating I’ve continued to take classes at the Worcester Art Museum where I work as a gallery attendant.

Sometimes I wish I hadn’t taken my teachers’ instructions so literally. During my first art classes, I was so inexperienced that I interpreted the teacher’s instructions as a standard template for all future projects. For example, in one class they said to make 2 color studies and 3 value studies for a piece, and I would not realize that you don’t always have to do those steps for every piece you ever create. Later on I started to do things my own way, because it’s my natural tendency. I learned so much more by experimenting with different approaches.

Lately, with my most recent business venture of Post Meridiem Press, I’ve been doing a lot of research to learn new things like how to go about buying an ISBN for a book, how to format a publication page, and how to get my book into the library of congress database. I’m constantly researching and trying to figure things out.

I’ve learned over time that the best way for me to learn how to make something is to study very closely what other people do. I analyze what many people do, people I admire, and then I sometimes try to copy it and study it for practice. Eventually I get to a point where I can see individual elements that make up their creation, whether a website or a book or a piece of art, and I can extract out elements I like. For example a color combination, a certain texture, the use of line, a certain combination of font sizes. The more I see, the more I can generalize the elements. It’s the difference between seeing a specific font they are using, and seeing that they are using a font which matches their art in a pleasing way because there are similar curves present. Eventually I get to the point where I’m crafting “my own” thing, which is really a culmination of things I’ve perceived and studied and my innate preferences.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

Well, I’ve always enjoyed making art, but I wouldn’t say I was ever the “class artist” until college. In elementary school I loved math and building with erector sets, but I also enjoyed drawing imaginary creatures and writing stories. Later in high school I had a lot of interests ranging from robotics and programming to songwriting and wire sculpture. I felt drawn to art and music, but never thought I would be good enough to make it professionally, so I decided to pursue a degree in engineering. But when I got to college, the day to day coursework wasn’t what I expected. I had more of an inventor mentality where I wanted to tinker freely in the lab, but in real life, engineering involves many detailed calculations bound by the laws of physics. So, in the middle of sophomore year, I talked to my family and decided to change majors to interactive media and game development.

I am now a working fine artist, an author/illustrator, and most recently the founder and CEO of Post Meridiem Press, an independent publishing house. My visual art ranges from abstract mixed media pieces to plein air paintings and picture book illustrations. The majority of my art reflects my personal experiences with neurodivergence, emotional intensity, and anxiety. I sell my art through gallery shows and seasonal outdoor events in Worcester, MA.

On the publishing side of my career, with Post Meridiem Press, I hope to push the bounds of what fine art and books can be. I enjoy experimenting with formats and my illustrations lean heavily into the realm of fine art. My first picture book under the Post Meridiem Press imprint, “I Live for the Sun,” is scheduled to release in September 2023.

I think what sets me apart is the variety of work that I do and my creative process. I bounce between working from life and creating abstract work and working on my books. I also play piano and write poetry for fun. It’s all a really big creative outlet for me to express myself. I enjoy pushing myself and am always discovering new ways of using mediums, new styles for new books and new characters. Over the past several years I’ve tried acrylic, ink, wax crayon, colored pencils, markers, graphite, gouache, oil pastel, charcoal, and more. But recently I’ve gravitated towards a more simplistic approach and am mainly focussed on publishing my next book.

I’m most proud of the fact that I’m functioning in day to day life and keep creating new work and sharing it with people. For a while when I was younger I was dealing with a very stressful home situation with a close family member who has chronic mental illness, and a difficult school situation after I was placed in special education. I felt very misunderstood, like an outsider, and for a while I never thought I could handle college or live away from my family. So looking back on where I came from, I feel proud that I’m this independent and working towards my goals.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

I mostly create as a constructive emotional outlet and for the joy of it. I am drawn to characters who go against the grain, partially because that’s my own tendency as a human. Many times when I was younger my differences were shamed. But now I am embracing my identity and building a brand which specializes in publishing nontraditional content. I hope to show that well-crafted, independently published books can be just as powerful as traditionally published books. I also hope my characters who are neurodivergent, have mental illness, or identify as LGBTQ+ help people with shared experiences feel seen and valued.

Are there any books, videos, essays or other resources that have significantly impacted your management and entrepreneurial thinking and philosophy?

Yes, most recently I’ve been reading Steve Jobs.

It’s so interesting reading about the differences between Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. Jobs, who wanted to make money off everything, demanded excellence and could sometimes be an abusive asshole. And then Woz, the kinder soul who enjoyed inventing extraordinary technology, but was not interested in profitability. I admire certain traits in both of them.

One of my favorite quotes by Jobs is “The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.” I’ve come to the realization that as a business owner and artist I need to possess a certain level of arrogance. I need to believe in my soul that I can do great things with my life, that I can make powerful changes in the world and create powerful books which change people’s lives. These grandiose ideas can make me seem like a pretentious egotist, but in order for me to achieve even a fraction of these longshot goals, I need to believe wholeheartedly that I am capable of it.

Now, I have mixed feelings on productivity and the human activities in this day in age in western society, so focussed on goals and making money and making progress. But the goals I set for myself really help me to exist in a world full of huge problems. I feel so powerless in regards to the current atrocities on Earth, but focussing on the fact that I am a human with enough resources to create art and bring people joy and help inspire people, that is something I can control, and that is something I enjoy trying to achieve.

Contact Info:

• Website: parkermilgram.com and postmeridiempress.com
• Instagram: @parkermilgram and @postmeridiempress
• Linkedin: Parker Milgram