Bill Wright is a Texas photographer, author and businessman. He splits his time between Abilene and Fort Davis.
Bill Wright
Bill Wright helped bring to life Abilene: An American Centennial, an album of photographs that captures the hopes and joys of Abilene, Texas, organized Historic Texas and Contemporary Texas, two books of photographs published by Texas Monthly Press, and The Union Guide to Texas Photographic Collections, published by the Texas A & M University Press. In addition, he has written and/or photographed nine books. Two of these, The Tigua: Pueblo Indians of Texas, winner of the Border Book Award, and The Kickapoo: Keepers of Tradition, are part of a series on Texas Indian tribes. Portraits from the Desert: Bill Wright’s Big Bend, is a collection of photographs and essays on the Big Bend of Texas.
His fourth book, People’s Lives: A Celebration of the Human Spirit, was published in the spring of 2001. The Texas Outback: Ranching on the Last Frontier was written in conjunction with photographer June Van Cleef. Rounding out the list of his published books are Fort Phantom Hill, A Bridge from Darkness to Light, Oman: Land of Diversity, and Authentic Texas: People of the Big Bend, and The Whole Damn Cheese: Maggie Smith, now in its second printing. Look for his latest publication, Across the Border and Back, with text by Marcia Daudistel and photographs by Bill Wright. He is a 2020 inductee of the Texas Institute of Letters.
Mr. Wright’s photographs reside in many public and private collections including the British Library in London, the National Museum of Art in Washington, DC, the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at the University of Texas at Austin, the Rockwell Museum in Corning, New York, the Princeton Collections of Western Americana in Princeton, New Jersey, the Amon Carter Museum in Ft. Worth, the Smithsonian Museum of American History in Washington, DC, the Southwest Writer’s Collection at San Marcos, the Museum of New Mexico, the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History at the Universtity of Texas, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.
He is an instrument rated, multi-engine qualified pilot, a scuba driver, amateur radio operator (N5DCI), and a member of the First Baptist Church of Abilene.
Bill Wright was married to photographer Alice Everett Wright who died in 2018. Their daughter, Alison, is a civic volunteer and photographer in Midland, and their son, Mitchell Wright, is a landscape architect, urban planner, and photographer in Austin. Bill has six grandchildren, two great-grandchildren and Rio, an eighty-pound Standard Poodle.