Ohio Lands | Eric Wright
Tour Ohio Lands
in the Artsy's Viewing Room with artist commentary
Through dozens of small paintings, a London-based artist engages in a fantasy memory game with the landscape of his native Ohio as well as the inflated aspirations of its founders and settlers "who chose to stamp their conquests as righteous by name at least."
Born Mt. Gilead, Ohio, Wright lived in NY in the 1980s where his painting techniques were influenced by the TV maestro Bob Ross. Selected for the artist residency at the Banff Centre by pop artist Greg Curnoe, he later relocated to London where he has spent the last 30 years.
Wright's work has appeared in galleries across Europe and the UK and has been curated by Paul Noble at City Racing, Stephen Friedman Gallery (London) and Hans-Ulrich Obrist’s Life/Live (Paris). His portraits of Country music stars are found in collections in Europe and Nashville including that of George Jones.
While the ambiguous pictorialism -- along with Wright’s exquisite formal and technical chops - is a constant, the stylistic heterogeneity provokes associations ranging from circus banner paintings to stills from David Lynch movies, from vertiginous Pieter Bruegal vistas to vintage handtinted photographic postcards, from the visionary landscape paintings of Norbert Cox and William Kurelek to Dean Koontz paperback covers celebrating the dark strain of Gothic Americana in popular culture. - Doug Harvey, Both Lost and Found: The Ohio Lands