Modern and Contemporary Craft: Selections from the Robert L. Pfannebecker Collection

Exhibited

"Cranbrook to Lancaster and Back: Contemporary Works in Clay, Fiber and Metal from the Robert L. Pfannebecker Collection", Network Gallery, Cranbrook Art Museum, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, January 29 - March 26, 2005 (two works from present lot exhibited)

Literature

Susan Cummins et al., In Flux: American Jewelry and the Counterculture, Arnoldsche, Stuttgart, 2020, p. 116 (for a discussion of the artist)

Artist Biography

Donald Wright was born in St. Louis, Missouri in 1930. He received his BS from Missouri State University and his MFA from the Cranbrook Academy of Art. An artistic polymath and renaissance man, Wright was a sculptor, goldsmith, architectural designer, and author. For several years he ran and operated galleries in Lancaster, Pennsylvania and Santa Fe, New Mexico. Wright came to know Robert L. Pfannebecker in the early 1960s and designed the Pfannebecker residence in 1964/65. Robert Pfannebecker was a long-time patron of Wright's, acquiring the artist's jewelry and sculpture. In the 1960s and 70s, Wright's work was frequently referenced in Craft Horizons magazine and exhibited widely. The sale of works from the Pfannebecker Collection represents the largest public offering of Wright's artistic career.