Jimmy Wright has been president of the Pastel Society of America since 2013. Founded in 1972 by Flora B. Giffuni and headquartered in The National Arts Club in New York, the society has grown during his tenure. Last year, the society’s 50th annual exhibition, Enduring Brilliance, featured works from 33 states and 11 international countries and offered over $50,000 in awards. Wright is a master pastelist in the society, a designation for PSA members who have accumulated three PSA annual exhibition awards. In 2018, he was named an academician of the National Academy of Design.
Raised on a farm in western Kentucky, his parents subscribed to five newspapers as well as Reader’s Digest and Life Magazine. It was in Life that he learned about artists such as Jackson Pollock, Frank Lloyd Wright, Picasso and Matisse. One issue contained a series of photos of Picasso’s home near Nice on the French Riviera and, at the age of about nine, he knew “that was exactly how I wanted to live.” He was already on his way, drawing and painting in watercolor. Years later he was a cover artist for Reader’s Digest.
He spent a summer with his aunt and her husband in Denver, where his aunt enrolled him in an art class taught by Lester Burbank Bridaham. Bridaham had been a student and studio monitor for Kimon Nicolaides who wrote the seminal book, The Natural Way to Draw. Jimmy had also spent time observing and drawing the figure, learning to “look” and developing hand-eye coordination.
This story is from the June 2023 edition of American Art Collector.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the June 2023 edition of American Art Collector.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
Guardians of the Temple – Simon Dinnerstein reflects on The Fulbright Triptych 50 years later.
The Palmer Museum of Art at Penn State University exhibits Simon Dinnerstein's The Fulbright Triptych haunts the visual lexicon of 20th century American representational art. Fifty years have passed since Dinnerstein completed the painting in 1974.
A City Perspective
Leslie Gaduzo has always been interIested in art. Since childhood, he has been drawing constantly, from single point perspective drawings at age 10 to complex architectural drawings.
Living Legacy
The Butler Institue hosts Allied Artists of America's 110th Annual Juried Exhibition.
Elegant yet Approachable
The second edition of the RTIA Show presents even more art to explore and expanded special programming.
Figuratively Speaking
New York has always been an epicenter of artists on the edge of excellence, pushing the envelope and finding their voices.
JAMES AYERS: The Importance of Play
Like many artists, James Ayers' work took a turn during the Covid-19 pandemic. Seeing the enjoyment his kids took from playing with paint in his studio and exploring their creativity inspired him.
GINA MINICHINO: Playing with Food
Gina Minichino started her journey in visual arts because of Charles Schulz. \"He was my earliest influence for drawing and the reason I wanted to be a cartoonist,\" she says.
Island Light
The Cuttyhunk Island Artists' Residency is held in a sprawling, 100-year-old house on an island off the southern coast of Massachusetts.
Solitary Forms
Hogan Brown has been working with Arcadia Contemporary for two and half years and is excited to be featured in his first solo show at the gallery. He doesn't take for granted the many talented figurative painters Arcadia represents and is thrilled to be among them.
Living the Dream
Counterintuitively, David Gluck was a painter before taking up tattooing little more than a decade ago. While skin is a completely different substrate and ink a far cry from oil paint, the skills must be transferrable to some degree because there is a wait-time of nine months to get an appointment with him.
