Jimmy Wright (born 1944) is an American visual artist, who became firstly known in the 1970s for his series of bold paintings representing libertine scenes in gay ambiances in the ''Meatpacking district'' of Manhattan; later on, for his unanticipated line of "deeply expressive", often lethargic, sunflowers which earned praise in newspapers and other art sources in the early years of the new millennium. His artwork, including his ''floating heads'' and drag themed pieces'','' are included in the collections of leading museums such as the

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

, the

Whitney Museum of American Art The Whitney Museum of American Art, known informally as "The Whitney", is an art museum in the Meatpacking District and West Village neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1930 by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (1875–1942), ...

, the

Art Institute of Chicago The Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago's Grant Park, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the world. Recognized for its curatorial efforts and popularity among visitors, the museum hosts approximately 1.5 mill ...

, the

Hammer Museum The Hammer Museum, which is affiliated with the University of California, Los Angeles, is an art museum and cultural center known for its artist-centric and progressive array of exhibitions and public programs. Founded in 1990 by the entrepreneur- ...

, the Springfield Art Museum, His art has been shown in many solo and group exhibitions worldwide. Wright has been a president of the Pastel Society of America since 2013. He was born in Union City, TN and raised in rural Kentucky.

Career

Outset

Early in the 1960s he attended art courses at

Murray State University Murray State University (MSU) is a public university in Murray, Kentucky. In addition to the main campus in Calloway County in southwestern Kentucky, Murray State operates extended campuses offering upper level and graduate courses in Paducah, H ...

(

Murray, KY Murray is a home rule-class city in Calloway County, Kentucky, United States. It is the seat of Calloway County and the 19th-largest city in Kentucky. The city's population was 17,741 during the 2010 U.S. census, and its micropolitan area's po ...

), and the Aspen School of Contemporary Art ( Aspen, CO). In 1964 he moved to Illinois during four years, to attend the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where he became exposed to the ideas of

imagist Imagism was a movement in early-20th-century Anglo-American poetry that favored precision of imagery and clear, sharp language. It is considered to be the first organized literary modernism, modernist literary movement in the English language. ...

master

Ray Yoshida Raymond "Ray" Kakuo Yoshida (October 3, 1930 – January 10, 2009) was an American artist known for his paintings and collages, and for his contributions as a teacher at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago from 1959 to 2005. He was an import ...

and some of his pupils (including Philip Hanson,

Christina Ramberg Christina Ramberg (21 August 1946–1995) was an American painter associated with the Chicago Imagists, a group of representational artists who attended the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in the late 1960s. The Imagists took their cues from ...

, and Roger Brown). After a lapse including stays in "Little Egypt" (

Carbondale, IL Carbondale is a city in Jackson and Williamson Counties, Illinois, United States, within the Southern Illinois region informally known as "Little Egypt". The city developed from 1853 because of the stimulation of railroad construction into the ...

) and

Los Angeles, CA Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

, and land-travel across Eurasian countries, he moved to his permanent residence in

Bowery The Bowery () is a street and neighborhood in Lower Manhattan in New York City. The street runs from Chatham Square at Park Row, Worth Street, and Mott Street in the south to Cooper Square at 4th Street in the north.Jackson, Kenneth L. "B ...

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

in 1974.

Degrees

Wright graduated with honors as a

Bachelor of Fine Arts A Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) is a standard undergraduate degree for students for pursuing a professional education in the visual, fine or performing arts. It is also called Bachelor of Visual Arts (BVA) in some cases. Background The Bachelor ...

from the

School of The Art Institute of Chicago The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) is a private art school associated with the Art Institute of Chicago (AIC) in Chicago, Illinois. Tracing its history to an art students' cooperative founded in 1866, which grew into the museum and ...

in 1967, subsequently as a

Master of Fine Arts A Master of Fine Arts (MFA or M.F.A.) is a terminal degree in fine arts, including visual arts, creative writing, graphic design, photography, filmmaking, dance, theatre, other performing arts and in some cases, theatre management or arts admini ...

from

Southern Illinois University Southern Illinois University is a system of public universities in the southern region of the U.S. state of Illinois. Its headquarters is in Carbondale, Illinois. Board of trustees The university is governed by the nine member SIU Board of Tr ...

in 1971.

Climax

Wright's move to New York City in 1974 concurred with the height of

punk Punk or punks may refer to: Genres, subculture, and related aspects * Punk rock, a music genre originating in the 1970s associated with various subgenres * Punk subculture, a subculture associated with punk rock, or aspects of the subculture s ...

and

gay culture Gay men are male homosexuals. Some bisexual and homoromantic men may also dually identify as gay, and a number of young gay men also identify as queer. Historically, gay men have been referred to by a number of different terms, including '' ...

upsurge. His participation in the queer nightlife flourishing in the city gave him the opportunity to artistically capture some of its grungy atmospheres, creating a body of work that received recognition years later, when his piece ''Anvil #1 (''ink, pen, inkwash on paper'')'' made its way to the

Whitney Museum The Whitney Museum of American Art, known informally as "The Whitney", is an art museum in the Meatpacking District, Manhattan, Meatpacking District and West Village neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1930 by Gertrude ...

permanent collection, and whose subject may reminisce the spirit of earlier ''whore scenes'' he had depicted in Chicago. The arrival of the AIDS epidemic in the late 1970s brought about an end to the freewheeling life, where the artist had been clipping the themes of his representations. In subsequent years, Wright's depicted blasphemic impressions of the ecclesiastic rituals he witnessed during childhood, among many other themes. Around 1988, the diagnosis of AIDS of the artist's partner Ken Nuzzo somehow prompted a major turn in the contents of Wright's paintings, giving way to the ascent of his series of pastels of sunflowers and other blossoms, a shift lasting for over the following two decades. A retrospective show with many pieces from Wright's early work, including prints, drawings, paintings, and sculptural works, were exhibited at Corbett vs. Dempsey art gallery (Chicago) in 2004. A detailed exhibition of many of his works is available online.

Critique

Art writer

Johanna Fateman Johanna Rachel Fateman (born May 16, 1974) is an American writer, songwriter, musician, and record producer. She is a member of the post-punk rock band Le Tigre and founded the band MEN with Le Tigre bandmate JD Samson. Early life and education ...

discerns on stylistic traits (''voluptuous, ebullient, funny'') and masterly influences (Bosch, Goya, Toulouse-Lautrec, Yoshida) perceivable in Wright's artwork. David Fierman, in turn, finds his drawings "fantastical and brutally real, sophisticated and youthfully playful". Referring to his oeuvre on the subculture of gay bathhouses and clubs, the artist once ascertained that such scenarios were ''too rich visually not to record''. On his side, critic

Grace Glueck Grace Glueck (July 24, 1926 – October 8, 2022) was an American arts journalist. She worked for ''The New York Times'' from 1951 until the early 2010s. Early life Glueck was born in New York City on July 24, 1926. Her father, Ernest, worked a ...

celebrates the visual explosiveness, and the abstract fluidity in Wright's blossom pieces, whose ''dense central hearts shoot out trails of petals and tendrils''.

Membership

He is a member of the Pastel Society of America where he has served as President since 2013, the advisory editorial boards of The Pastel Journal magazine and The Artist’s Magazine and the 1866 Founder’s Circle at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. His teaches summer courses at the Ox-Bow School of Art, and sponsors art students at Southern Illinois University.

Exhibitions

Wright's artwork has been the object of many solo exhibitions in the US, among them: * 1994 - “Sunflowers,” Midtown Payson Galleries, New York, NY New York Magazine 18 Apr 1994, page 165 * 1999 - “Jimmy Wright,” Lizan-Tops Gallery, East Hampton, NY * 2001 - “Jimmy Wright: Recent Work,” DC Moore Gallery, New York, NY * 2004 - “Jimmy Wright: Radiant, an overview 1963-2004,” Corbett vs. Dempsey, Chicago, IL. * 2005 - “Jimmy Wright: An Overview, 1964-2004,” Eagle Art Gallery, Murray State University, Murray, KY * 2006 - Works on canvas and paper by Jimmy Wright. Argazzi Art, Lakeville, CT * 2007 - “Lost Women,” Corbett vs Dempsey, Chicago, IL * 2009 “Jimmy Wright: Twenty Years of Paintings and Pastels,” Springfield Museum of Art,Springfield, MO * 2016 - Jimmy Wright, New York Underground, Fierman, NYC * 2016 - Jimmy Wright: New York Underground, Corbett vs Dempsey, Chicago, IL * 2019 - “The Queen’s Court,” Fierman Gallery, New York * 2019 - Jimmy Wright solo, M+B Gallery, LA * 2022 - "Flowers for Ken", Fierman Gallery, Pike St, New York His art has also been exhibited at international shows in several countries including Austria, UK, Canada, China and Japan.

Honors

* 2018 Elected National Academician,

National Academy of Design The National Academy of Design is an honorary association of American artists, founded in New York City in 1825 by Samuel Morse, Asher Durand, Thomas Cole, Martin E. Thompson, Charles Cushing Wright, Ithiel Town, and others "to promote the fin ...

. * 2011 Founder’s Award given by the Flora B. Giffuni Foundation, Pastel Society of America * 2009 Art Spirit Foundation - Gold Medal Award, Pastel Society of America

Gallery

File:Anvil-No1, ink on paper.jpg, Anvil-No1, ink on paper 10 1/4 × 10 3/16in Whitney Museum of American Art File:Poppers-Club Baths, Watercolor, crayon on paper.jpg, Poppers-Club Baths, Watercolor, crayon on paper File:Portrait-of-the-Artist, pastel.jpg, Portrait-of-the-Artist, pastel File:Three-Sunflowers-on-Blue, pastel.jpg, Three-Sunflowers-on-Blue, pastel File:Double Basket, oil on canvas.jpg, Double Basket, oil on canvas File:Raft-of-Medusa, oil.jpg, Raft-of-Medusa, oil File:Sunflower-Head, oil.jpg, Sunflower-Head, oil File:Leopard-Woman, ink on paper.jpg, Leopard-Woman, ink on paper

References

External links

Artist's websiteCatalogs on Worldcat

Jimmy Wright : paintings and pastels by Jimmy Wright(Book)

Jimmy Wright : radiant by Jimmy Wright(Book)

The Lost Women : Jimmy Wright by Jimmy Wright(Book)

Jimmy Wright. Bathhouse, meatpacking district and the dream cards. New York underground 1973-1990(Book)

Jimmy Wright : recent paintings and pastels by Jimmy Wright( Book)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wright, Jimmy 1944 births Artists from Tennessee Living people Pastel artists American contemporary painters National Academy of Design members