ERIK PARKER

I’ve been inspired by the neo-expressionists. Fourteen two-by-fours lying on the floor are just not as interesting as a big painting with shards of crockery. Painting was left for dead in the ’70s, but neo-expressionism was something people could relate to. I don’t know that there is anything wrong with Minimalism. I think most people like it; the curators love it. But I don’t think it speaks to a very wide audience. It’s an inside joke, a tea-party joke. My work is more like a Richard Pryor joke, or early Redd Foxx, maybe Blowfly: Everyone gets it, and hopefully the whole audience laughs.

—As told to Larissa Harris