Drawing on the Past: Smashing Fashion! The 60s Illustration of Bonnie Parkinson.

Reviewed by Beth Stewart

London artist Bonnie Parkinson began her career as a commercial artist in the 1960s before turning to fine art in the 1980s and ultimately making her mark in both worlds. Smashing Fashion! The 60s Illustration of Bonnie Parkinson, which runs to January. 10, at TAP Centre for Creativity, is all about her commercial beginnings but with a contemporary twist.

Visitors are treated to 29 pieces, including seven of Parkinson’s original full-page ads from her time working at the London Free Press (LFP) and at Eaton’s, as well as twenty-two 60s-influenced pieces produced late in 2025.

(London Free Press, Special Fashion Section, Eaton’s ad 1969 detail. Courtesy of Bonnie Parkinson and Andrew Lewis.)

To fully appreciate the show, it is helpful to have a sense of the artist’s history.

Parkinson’s early career is a young artist’s dream. She was hired while still in her final year of the Special Art Programme at Beal to work part-time in the art department of the LFP. Upon graduation in 1960, she transitioned to the LFP’s full-time fashion artist.

Ladies’ fashion was in its heyday. Parkinson recalls, “At that time, London had many independent women’s fashion stores; my job was to do all these different stores, but each with a distinctive style.”

In 1964, she left the LFP to work for the T. Eaton Company (Wellington Square, London, Ontario). Between 1967 and 1968, she worked with Canadian fashion designer Marilyn Brooks at The Unicorn (Clarence St., London, Ontario) while continuing to freelance for Eaton’s in the evenings. From 1973 to 1974, Parkinson worked full-time at the Total Marketing Advertising Agency, London, Ontario. Then, in 1979, she was hired by Fanshawe College to teach illustration as well as life-drawing to fashion design students.

(Eaton’s ad 1968, fashion duo in fuchsia detail. Courtesy of Parkinson and Lewis.)

Parkinson describes her early illustrations as stylized and heavily influenced by the 60s phenomenon. It was an exciting time, and she met it with gusto. She drew directly on paper with a fine line marker, no pencil sketch first, and just put down what she saw. The emphasis was on the designed page, bold colour, and elegant lines.

In 1982, at the age of 40, Parkinson left commercial art entirely to paint full-time. Since then, Parkinson has been a constant in the arts community, exhibiting both locally and elsewhere.

(Eaton’s ad 1963, fashion trio in yellow detail. Courtesy of Parkinson and Lewis.)

What prompted Parkinson to put this Smashing Fashion! exhibition together? After 40-plus years as a painter, why did she circle back to fashion art at this point in time? Parkinson credits artist Andrew Lewis.

Lewis approached her in October 2025 with the idea for this show. He thought it was important to show the advertising fashion work that had been done right here in London, Ontario, as art. Parkinson agreed.

She quickly discovered that to do new illustrations of 60s fashions, some sixty years later, took some serious resetting. On top of this, it took a while for her to get back to pen and ink.

She also did an online refresher of the wild and crazy 60s Fashions.

(Bonnie Parkinson’s new illustration of swinging London England’s fashion icon Jean Shrimpton.)

Smashing Fashion! occupies the front two rooms of TAP that comprise Lab 203. It is an intimate area that is well used by Parkinson. The art is simply hung with minuscule magnets for maximum impact.

The full-page ads from the LFP are nostalgic nods to a once vibrant industry. Parkinson’s new illustrations effectively invoke the fashion sense that was part of the 60s’ cultural revolution, but in a less stylized manner and with more attention to detail in the fabrics. As a whole, the 2025 pieces present a veritable rogues’ gallery of the 60s with Andy Warhol, Cher, Jean Shrimpton and Twiggy amongst leggy young things sporting an array of bold patterns and designs.

(One of Parkinson’s new illustrations of 60s clothes.)

Smashing Fashion! The 60s Illustration of Bonnie Parkinson runs to January 10. A Meet the Artist reception is planned for Saturday, January 3, from 1 to 3 pm. It’s a hip way to start the New Year.

For more information about this exhibition and others at TAP Centre for Creativity, visit https://www.tapcreativity.org/

Follow Bonnie Parkinson on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/bonnieparkinson_artist/?hl=en

Reviewed by Beth Stewart