Joseph Wright of Derby - an overview
Joseph Wright was born in Derby in 1734. He rose to fame in the mid-late 1760s with a series of spectacular paintings depicting groups of people in darkened interiors, lit by a candle or lamp, which he exhibited at the annual exhibitions of the Society of Artists in London.
However, he was a deeply versatile painter whose interest in the emotional, as well as visual, power of art led him to make pictures that crossed many different genres, from portraits and narrative paintings drawn from both modern and historical literature, or contemporary events, to landscape painting.
Such variety reflects the influence of the artist’s circle of friends and associates, with whom Wright collaborated openly on the development and sale of his work. These included the printmaker William Pether, who not only inspired some of the subjects in Wright’s paintings, but whose highly accomplished mezzotints helped promote Wright’s work to a wide audience.
Nevertheless, he continued to live and work in Derby for most of his life; an unusual decision which helped to establish his nickname ‘Wright of Derby’.
Wright trained as a portraitist in the studio of Thomas Hudson in London and, finding it a reliable source of income, continued to paint portraits throughout his career.
Under Hudson’s tutelage, Wright had learned the rudiments of his craft, a process that initially involved making careful studies of the work of artists past and present – including Hudson’s own portraits – and, very occasionally, life drawing. By these means, he was inculcated with a deep and abiding interest in the work of the ‘Old Masters’, as well as a belief in the importance of the practice of drawing.
This is borne out by the survival of almost 400 of his works on paper, just over 300 of which are now in the collection of Derby Museums. Made at every stage of his life, drawing provided a means for Wright to record, test, communicate and exchange ideas. It was to prove particularly important during a trip to Italy between 1773 and 1775, where he made at least 240 studies recording some of the most famous works of Classical Antiquity and the Renaissance, together with atmospheric ruins and the unique natural features of the Italian landscape.
Of these, his imagination was most greatly fired by Mount Vesuvius, which he witnessed during an excursion to Naples in 1774. Over the next twenty years, he made more than 30 paintings of the volcano as well as numerous depictions of Italian and British landscapes, many of which he sold straight from his easel.
Though Wright was a regular contributor to various exhibiting societies throughout his life, including the Society of Artists and the Royal Academy, his relationship with the art establishment and some of his fellow artists became increasingly strained.
This would lead to bitter quarrels – some of which were recorded in the national press – and ultimately an almost complete retreat from public life in favour of his native Derby. Correspondence with friends suggests that this was partly influenced by his poor state of mental health, which was itself exacerbated by political schisms and competitiveness in the societies with which he was most closely involved.
After a series of arguments over the display of his work during the 1780s, beginning with the Royal Academy in the early 1780s, and followed by John Boydell of the Shakespeare Gallery later that same decade, Wright exhibited his work for the last time in 1794.
In the same year, he made a sketching excursion to the Lake District, later using his drawings as the basis for several outstanding paintings through which he explored the area’s most sublime landscapes under a variety of light and weather conditions.
The trip was also undertaken with a view to improving his health, which was now fast declining. According to family, and the testimony of friends, Wright was suffering from a disease of the liver, the cause of which was thought to be paint.
Ironically, it seems that the lead white which was so central to his depiction of light in some of his most renowned paintings, may also have been the cause of his death, just five days before his sixty-third birthday, in 1797. He was buried in St Alkmund’s Church in Derby but was moved to Nottingham Road Cemetery when the church demolished to make way for a new inner ring road in 1968.