Jey Parks is an American

comics artist A cartoonist is a visual artist who specializes in both drawing and writing cartoons (individual images) or comics (sequential images). Cartoonists differ from comics writers or comics illustrators/artists in that they produce both the literar ...

fan art Fan art or fanart is artwork created by Fan (person), fans of a work of fiction or celebrity depicting events, Character (arts), character, or other aspect of the work. As fan labor, fan art refers to artworks that are not created, commissione ...

ist and scientific illustrator. Parks is most known for their fan art pieces ''Doctor Mew'' (''

Doctor Who ''Doctor Who'' is a British science fiction television series broadcast by the BBC since 1963. The series, created by Sydney Newman, C. E. Webber and Donald Wilson (writer and producer), Donald Wilson, depicts the adventures of an extraterre ...

''s

the Doctor The Doctor, sometimes known as Doctor Who, is the protagonist of the long-running BBC science fiction television series ''Doctor Who''. An extraterrestrial Time Lord, the Doctor travels the universe in a time travelling spaceship called th ...

as cats) and ''The Catvengers'' ( the Avengers also as cats) and their books ''Star Trek Cats'' and ''Star Trek: The Next Generation Cats''.

Background

Parks started drawing cat versions of people since about age 11 or 12. Around 12, they loved ''

The Phantom of the Opera The Phantom of the Opera may refer to: Novel * The Phantom of the Opera (novel), ''The Phantom of the Opera'' (novel), 1910 novel by Gaston Leroux Characters * Erik (The Phantom of the Opera), Erik (''The Phantom of the Opera''), the title char ...

'' and had a

running gag A running gag, or running joke, is a literary device that takes the form of an amusing joke or a comical reference and appears repeatedly throughout a work of literature or other form of storytelling. Though they are similar, catchphrases are no ...

about ''The Phantom of the Cats''. Eventually, they drew the characters as cats. A few years later, Parks became obsessed with the British television series ''

''. Around 2008, Parks began drawing more realistic ''Doctor Who'' cats. Parks has a

Bachelor's degree A bachelor's degree (from Medieval Latin ''baccalaureus'') or baccalaureate (from Modern Latin ''baccalaureatus'') is an undergraduate degree awarded by colleges and universities upon completion of a course of study lasting three to six years ...

( BFA) in Illustration from the California College of Arts and a graduate degree in

scientific illustration An illustration is a decoration, interpretation, or visual explanation of a text, concept, or process, designed for integration in print and digitally published media, such as posters, Flyer (pamphlet), flyers, magazines, books, teaching material ...

from the

UC Santa Cruz The University of California, Santa Cruz (UC Santa Cruz or UCSC) is a public land-grant research university in Santa Cruz, California, United States. It is one of the ten campuses in the University of California system. Located in Monterey Bay ...

. Previously, Parks drew wildlife like

big cat The term "big cat" is typically used to refer to any of the five living members of the genus ''Panthera'', namely the tiger, lion, jaguar, leopard, and snow leopard. All cats descend from the ''Felidae'' family, sharing similar musculature, c ...

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class (biology), class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the Oviparity, laying of Eggshell, hard-shelled eggs, a high Metabolism, metabolic rate, a fou ...

dinosaur Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic Geological period, period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the #Evolutio ...

s, fruit bats,

insect Insects (from Latin ') are Hexapoda, hexapod invertebrates of the class (biology), class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body (Insect morphology#Head, head, ...

s, and

plant Plants are the eukaryotes that form the Kingdom (biology), kingdom Plantae; they are predominantly Photosynthesis, photosynthetic. This means that they obtain their energy from sunlight, using chloroplasts derived from endosymbiosis with c ...

s. Their work can be found via iPhone apps for the

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an List of federal agencies in the United States, agency of the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government, within the US Department of the Interior. The service manages all List ...

. Parks would regularly attend conventions as C2E2,

San Diego Comic-Con San Diego Comic-Con is a comic book convention and multi-genre entertainment event held annually in San Diego, California, at the San Diego Convention Center. Founded in 1970, originally showcasing primarily comic books and science fiction/fant ...

, and

WonderCon WonderCon is an annual comic book, science fiction, and film fan convention, convention held in the San Francisco Bay Area (1987–2011), then—under the name WonderCon Anaheim—in Anaheim, California (2012–2015, 2017–present), and Wond ...

. Parks' art is drawn and painted digitally via Paint Tool SAI and

Photoshop Adobe Photoshop is a raster graphics editor developed and published by Adobe for Windows and macOS. It was created in 1987 by Thomas and John Knoll. It is the most used tool for professional digital art, especially in raster graphics editin ...

. Parks creates their art digitally with a Cintiq

graphics tablet A graphics tablet (also known as a digitizer, digital graphic tablet, pen tablet, drawing tablet, external drawing pad or digital art board) is a computer input device that enables a user to hand draw or paint images, animations and graphics, w ...

via

. Their fan art career took off with a table at the 2011 San Diego Comic-Con where they had ''Doctor Mew'' buttons and posters as well as when ''Doctor Mew'' went viral. Parks became famous due to ''Doctor Mew''. Later, Parks created other fan art pieces as ''The Catvengers''. ''Doctor Mew'' represented their most prominent work until ''Star Trek Cats'' in 2017. In March 2018, ''Star Trek Cats'' was followed-up with ''Star Trek: The Next Generation Cats''. Parks also has a

Patreon Patreon (, ) is a monetization platform operated by Patreon, Inc., that provides business tools for content creators to run a subscription service and sell digital products. It helps artists and other creators earn a recurring income by provid ...

account.

Works

Books

Comics

Marvel Comics Marvel Comics is a New York City–based comic book publishing, publisher, a property of the Walt Disney Company since December 31, 2009, and a subsidiary of Disney Publishing Worldwide since March 2023. Marvel was founded in 1939 by Martin G ...

Senior Editor Steve Wacker found Jey Parks at their booth at San Diego Comic-Con and approached them to do animal

variant cover In comic books, a variant cover (sometimes variant edition) refers to an issue of a comic book printed with multiple covers, each with unique cover art. The first comic book marketed with a variant cover was the 1986 first issue of ''The Man of St ...

s for Marvel and they said "Absolutely!" Parks has done animal variant covers for issues ''Iron Man'' #23, ''

The Superior Spider-Man ''The Superior Spider-Man'' is the name of three separate superhero American comic book, comic book series published by Marvel Comics, following Otto Octavius as he becomes List of incarnations of Spider-Man, Spider-Man. The first volume, that r ...

'' #27, ''Thor: God of Thunder'' #19, and '' Wolverine and the X-Men'' #1. On May 13, 2013,

Tumblr Tumblr (pronounced "tumbler") is a microblogging and Social networking service, social networking website founded by David Karp in 2007 and is owned by American company Automattic. The service allows users to post multimedia and other content ...

user sparkysmachine dressed their cat Sir Didymus to match the ''Thor: God of Thunder'' #19 animal variant cover. The "mini- Mjolnir and shoulder-thingies" were printed on their PrintrBot Jr.

3D printer 3D printing, or additive manufacturing, is the construction of a three-dimensional object from a CAD model or a digital 3D model. It can be done in a variety of processes in which material is deposited, joined or solidified under computer ...

. On October 29, 2014, to celebrate

National Cat Day National Cat Day is celebrated in various countries. In some areas it is an awareness day to raise public awareness of Pet adoption, cat adoption. Italy In Italy, National Cat Day is celebrated on February 17. The date was chosen in 1990 after ...

, Marvel Comics reposted Parks's animal variant covers on their

Facebook Facebook is a social media and social networking service owned by the American technology conglomerate Meta Platforms, Meta. Created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with four other Harvard College students and roommates, Eduardo Saverin, Andre ...

page.

Fan art

Parks's notable works include ''Doctor Mew'', ''The Catvengers'', and ''Star Trek Cats''. Others have included ''

Batman Batman is a superhero who appears in American comic books published by DC Comics. Batman was created by the artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger, and debuted in Detective Comics 27, the 27th issue of the comic book ''Detective Comics'' on M ...

'', ''

Deadpool Deadpool is a character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by Fabian Nicieza and Rob Liefeld, the character first appeared in ''New Mutants'' #98 (December 1990). In his comic book appearances, Deadpool is ...

'', ''

Dexter Dexter may refer to: People * Dexter (given name) * Dexter (surname) * Dexter (singer), Brazilian rapper Marcos Fernandes de Omena (born 1973) * Famous Dex, also known as Dexter, American rapper Dexter Tiewon Gore Jr. (born 1993) Places United ...

'', ''

Downton Abbey ''Downton Abbey'' is a British historical drama television series set in the early 20th century, created and co-written by Julian Fellowes. It first aired in the United Kingdom on ITV (TV network), ITV on 26 September 2010 and in the United St ...

'', ''

Game of Thrones ''Game of Thrones'' is an American Fantasy television, fantasy Drama (film and television), drama television series created by David Benioff and for HBO. It is an adaptation of ''A Song of Ice and Fire'', a series of high fantasy novels by ...

'', ''

Hannibal Hannibal (; ; 247 – between 183 and 181 BC) was a Punic people, Carthaginian general and statesman who commanded the forces of Ancient Carthage, Carthage in their battle against the Roman Republic during the Second Punic War. Hannibal's fat ...

'', ''

Harry Potter ''Harry Potter'' is a series of seven Fantasy literature, fantasy novels written by British author J. K. Rowling. The novels chronicle the lives of a young Magician (fantasy), wizard, Harry Potter (character), Harry Potter, and his friends ...

'', ''

How to Train Your Dragon ''How to Train Your Dragon'' is a media franchise from DreamWorks Animation and loosely based on the book series How to Train Your Dragon (novel series), of the same name by British author Cressida Cowell. It consists of three feature films: '' ...

'', ''

The Hunger Games ''The Hunger Games'' are a series of Young adult fiction, young adult Dystopian fiction, dystopian novels written by American author Suzanne Collins. The series consists of a trilogy that follows teenage protagonist Katniss Everdeen, and two ...

'', ''

The Lord of the Rings ''The Lord of the Rings'' is an Epic (genre), epic high fantasy novel written by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's book ''The Hobbit'' but eventually d ...

'', '' Sherlock'', ''

Spider-Man Spider-Man is a superhero in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by writer-editor Stan Lee and artist Steve Ditko, he first appearance, first appeared in the anthology comic book ''Amazing Fantasy'' #15 (August 1962) in ...

'', ''

Star Wars ''Star Wars'' is an American epic film, epic space opera media franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the Star Wars (film), eponymous 1977 film and Cultural impact of Star Wars, quickly became a worldwide popular culture, pop cu ...

'', ''

Stranger Things ''Stranger Things'' is an American television series created by the Duffer brothers, Duffer Brothers for Netflix. Produced by Monkey Massacre Productions and 21 Laps Entertainment, the Stranger Things season 1, first season was released on N ...

'', ''

Superman Superman is a superhero created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, which first appeared in the comic book ''Action Comics'' Action Comics 1, #1, published in the United States on April 18, 1938.The copyright date of ''Action Comics ...

'', ''

Supernatural Supernatural phenomena or entities are those beyond the Scientific law, laws of nature. The term is derived from Medieval Latin , from Latin 'above, beyond, outside of' + 'nature'. Although the corollary term "nature" has had multiple meanin ...

'', '' The Walking Dead'', and ''

Wonder Woman Wonder Woman is a superheroine who appears in American comic books published by DC Comics. The character first appeared in ''All Star Comics'' Introducing Wonder Woman, #8, published October 21, 1941, with her first feature in ''Sensation Comic ...

''. Commissions have included

John Hodgman John Kellogg Hodgman (born June 3, 1971) is an American author, actor, and humorist. In addition to his published written works, such as his satirical trilogy '' The Areas of My Expertise'', '' More Information Than You Require'', and '' That Is ...

and Gates McFadden as a Doctor

Beverly Crusher Beverly Crusher is a fictional character in the ''Star Trek'' franchise, played by Gates McFadden. Debuting in the television series '' Star Trek: The Next Generation'', McFadden appeared in every season, except for the second, as well as its ...

cat. In 2014, Parks presented a

gouache Gouache (; ), body color, or opaque watercolor is a water-medium paint consisting of natural pigment, water, a binding agent (usually gum arabic or dextrin), and sometimes additional inert material. Gouache is designed to be opaque. Gouach ...

painting of

Captain America Captain America is a superhero created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby who appears in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character first appeared in '' Captain America Comics'' #1, published on December 20, 1940, by Timely C ...

at the Cat Art Show in

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

Reception

Newsarama ''Newsarama'' is an American website that publishes news, interviews, and essays about the American comic book industry. It is owned by Future US. In June 2020, Newsarama was merged with the website ''GamesRadar+'', also owned by Future US. Hi ...

''s Chris Arrant called Jey Parks a "noted cat painter." ''Visual News''s Jessica Czeck said ''Doctor Mew'' made Jey Parks "internet famous." ''Bleeding Cool''s

Rich Johnston Richard "Rich" Johnston is a British comics creator, columnist, and founder of the comics news site ''Bleeding Cool''. '' The Comics Journal'' described Johnston as having claimed to be "the oldest extant comics news reporter on the Internet. ...

pointed out Parks was CatConLA's " e of the most sought-after artists." ''Catster''s Phillip Mlyner noted they were "a cat illustrator par excellence." ''Petslady.com''s Laurie Kay Olson deigned their work "delightful, entertaining, and more than just a little bit, well, catty." In October 2015, ''Outlaw Kritters'' staff selected Parks as the featured artist of the week. Reviewing ''Star Trek Cats'' in a thirty-year retrospective, ''

GeekDad GeekDad is a website covering multiple topics targeting fathers who categorize themselves as a "geek." Popular categories include Lego, ''Star Wars'' & Star Trek, video games, books, and field trips. GeekDad also publishes a regular podcast cover ...

''s Jules Sherred referred to them as "a great illustrator."

Personal life

Parks has a female

black Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness.Eva Heller, ''P ...

domestic short-haired cat A moggy is any cat which has not been intentionally bred. Moggies lack a consistent appearance unlike purebred cats that are Selective breeding, selectively bred for appearance conforming to a Breed standard, standard. In contexts where cats ne ...

named Mab and a male tuxedo cat Mamoko. In 2013, they lived in

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

. In 2016, they lived in

Denver Denver ( ) is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Consolidated city and county, consolidated city and county, the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Colorado, most populous city of the U.S. state of ...

Colorado Colorado is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States. It is one of the Mountain states, sharing the Four Corners region with Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. It is also bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Parks, Jey American comics artists American illustrators California College of the Arts alumni American digital artists University of California, Santa Cruz alumni Living people Year of birth missing (living people)

Background

Works

Books

Comics

Fan art

Reception

Personal life

See also

References