Tate Erases Richard Wright's Turner Winner

The abstract wall painting that won Richard Wright the 2009 Turner prize was destroyed last week. As intended. The Tate Britain’s art handlers sanded down Wright’s gold leaf fresco and painted over it when the Turner exhibition came to a close. While the Glasgow-based artist was not on hand to see his work go, the removal is nothing new for Wright, whose pieces are intended to be temporary and only exist in one’s memory once they’re gone. Wright, who the Times called “a cross between Sol LeWitt and Fabergé,” has left his familiar gold leaf fingerprint on many a surface previously and will likely do so on others to come. “I am interested in the fragility of the moment of engagement—in heightening that moment,” Wright previously told The Guardian of the impermanence of his work, which is quickly destroyed. “Sometimes I feel a sense of loss; sometimes of relief,” he said of the demolition process.