Living Wright

The Times of London profiles Turner Prize winner Richard Wright providing a detailed look at his art, its ambitions and goals:

At 49, this was his last chance to win the Turner Prize because artists over 50 are ineligible. He may not have been the bookies’ favourite — that was the installation artist Roger Hiorn — but going by the comments posted on the boards outside the gallery, where there were twice as many for Wright as for the other three shortlisted artists combined, the public love him. Richard Wright should win,” said one, “[For his] refreshing attitude to marketability and mortality. I’d quite like him to do my living room too.” […]

It takes Wright around five weeks of 12- hour days to produce one of his wall paintings. He has two assistants — but four for the exhibition at the Tate — one of whom is his brother. The process is painstaking. He begins by drawing his design on paper and then pricking hundreds of tiny holes to form a pattern before transferring the image to the wall using chalk. He applies a weak glue called size and then paints the final layer in gold leaf. […]

In a world where the contemporary artist can become an overnight millionaire, Wright has resisted doing anything even remotely self-serving for the best part of 30 years. At the beginning of January 2010, despite calls for its preservation, his prize-winning wall will be painted over with white emulsion. It’s the same thing that has happened to all but around 10 of his wall paintings for the past 20 years. […] Impermanence is part of Wright’s working life. A small number of works on paper survive but he only produces four or five a year; many more are disposed of. There would be a fortune to be made raiding the bins outside his studio.