( fl 1608; bur London, 5 April 1654). English sculptor. He was a tomb sculptor who appears to have trained as a haberdasher. He lived and worked at Charing Cross, Westminster, London, where he is first recorded in 1607-8. His artistic career began in partnership with the obscure John Key, with whom in 1608 he made the memorial to Sir William Paston (North Walsham, Norfolk, St Nicholas), a work that followed convention in its reliance on height and architectural display for effect. Wright continued to work in this manner, with some idiosyncrasies and refinements of detail, when commemorating Edward Talbot, 8th Earl of Shrewsbury (c. 1619; London, Westminster Abbey), Sir Robert Gardener (c. 1620; Elmswell, Suffolk, St John the Baptist) and Edward Seymour, Earl of Hertford, and his Family (c. 1621; Salisbury Cathedral). Later, however, he adopted the fashion for shrouded effigies, revealing a talent for figure sculpture in the tombs of Anne, Lady Deane (1634; Great Maplestead, Essex, St Giles) and Sir John Denham (c. 1639; Egham, Surrey, St John the Baptist). The weakness of his later work is in the design, which is sometimes very bizarre: columns intrude between the spectator and the effigies of Sir Richard Scott (1640; Ecclesfield, S. Yorks, St Mary), Sir Lionel Tollemache, Bart (c. 1640; Helmingham, Suffolk, St Mary) and Sir Robert Wiseman (c. 1641; Willingale Doe, Essex, St Christopher).
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