Ben Wright

Stanwood, WA

On view at the Bellevue Arts Museum

Ben Wright has an unusually diverse creative practice which draws in equal parts from his academic studies in evolutionary biology, traditional crafts, and conceptual art as well as from a life and career rich in collaborative synergy. While an undergrad at Dartmouth College, Ben tracked songbirds from the forests of upstate New Hampshire to tropical Jamaica for the renowned ornithologist Richard Homes. His art making often mirrors that chaotic yet scientific process and endeavors to better understand human nature through our clumsy, if well intentioned, interactions with our ever-evolving environment. He expresses himself through a wide range of fabricated objects, media and experiences that increasingly are coalescing into hyper sensory installations. Ben has taught and exhibited the fruits of this approach at numerous universities and venues in the United States and abroad in Germany, New York, Turkey, Denmark, Japan, Belgium, Poland and Australia. He is currently the Artistic Director of Pilchuck Glass School.

Migrations

As distillations of the artist’s maximalist installation practice, these fresh compositions blend elements of collage, optics and illumination to frame, probe and dissect modern myths about human’s roles in their ecological, technological, social and political environments. By observing ubiquitous examples and intricate patterns of migration, competition and cooperation within the natural world, we can better understand our destructive human tendencies towards unsustainably unbalanced relationships.