Walton Ford

Walton Ford (born 1960 in Larchmont, New York) is an American visual artist who makes paintings and prints in the style of naturalist illustrations, often depicting extinct species. In his more recent series of work such as shown in his 2025 "Tutto" exhibition at Gagosian Gallery in New York City, he has taken a more painterly approach. Each of his paintings is a meticulous, realistic study in flora and fauna, and is filled with symbols, clues, and jokes referencing texts ranging from colonial literature, to folktales, to travel guides. The paintings are complex allegorical narratives that critique the history of colonialism, industrialism, politics, natural science, and humanity's effect on the environment.

Early life and career

Ford recalled taking trips into the deep forest in Canada with his father as a child, exposing him to unspoiled wilderness. As a teenager, Ford became immersed in the underground cartoons of the 1960s, including ZAP and anything by Robert Crumb, whom he considers "a major influence".

He attended the Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, Rhode Island, and in 1982 was granted a BFA degree in Filmmaking. at the Morgan Library & Museum.

Example works

Tur, a 2007 large-scale work in the Smithsonian American Art Museum, depicts the aurochs, a prehistoric bull that gave rise to modern day cattle. The Latin inscription at the top left of the painting reads: "The Polish call me tur, the Germans call me aurox, and the ignorant call me bison." Another artwork in the same museum, Visitation, from 2004, depicts a large flock of passenger pigeons gorging themselves in a field strewn with fruit and nuts. The birds’ ravenous feasting on the bounty of the land can be seen to symbolize the exploitation of natural resources perpetrated by European settlers in the New World, which ultimately led to the extinction of their species.

Dying Words from 2005 is a combination color etching, aquatint, and drypoint on paper in the collection of the Honolulu Museum of Art. In this print, the extinct Carolina parakeet replaces people in Benjamin West's famous painting, The Death of General Wolfe.

Quotes

Monographs

Walton Ford: Pancha Tantra, Taschen Books, Köln, Germany 4th edition: 2020 Walton Ford, Flammarion, 2015 Walton Ford: Tigers of Wrath, Horses of Instruction Harry N. Abrams Book, 2002