Stephen Wiltshire - Career

Career

Wiltshire can look at a target once and then draw an accurate and detailed picture of it. He once drew the whole of New York after a helicopter trip above it. He also draws imaginary scenes, for example, St. Paul's Cathedral surrounded by flames.

Wiltshire's early books include Drawings (1987), Cities (1989), Floating Cities (1991), and Stephen Wiltshire's American Dream (1993). His third book, Floating Cities (Michael Joseph, 1991), was number one on the Sunday Times bestseller list.

In 2003, a retrospective of his work was held in the Orleans House gallery in Twickenham, London.

In May 2005 Stephen produced his longest ever panoramic memory drawing of Tokyo on a 32.8-foot-long (10.0 m) canvas within seven days following a helicopter ride over the city. Since then he has drawn Rome, Hong Kong, Frankfurt, Madrid, Dubai, Jerusalem and London on giant canvasses. When Wiltshire took the helicopter ride over Rome, he drew it in such great detail that he drew the exact number of columns in the Pantheon.

In October 2009 Stephen completed the last work in the series of panoramas, an 18-foot (5.5 m) memory drawing of his "spiritual home", New York City. Following a 20-minute helicopter ride over the city he sketched the view of New Jersey, Manhattan, the Financial District, Ellis Island, the Statue of Liberty and Brooklyn over five days at the Pratt Institute college of art and design in New York City.

In 2010, he made a series of drawings of Sydney, and visited Bermuda National Gallery where the sale of his drawing of Hamilton broke auction records. In June 2010, Christie's auctioned off an oil painting of his "Times Square at Night".

Wiltshire started a tour of China in September 2010, with a first project taking him to Shanghai.

A 2011 project in New York City involved Wiltshire's creation of a 250-foot (76 m) long panoramic memory drawing of New York which is now displayed on a giant billboard at JFK Airport. It is a part of a global advertising campaign for the Swiss bank UBS that carries the theme "We will not rest", The New York Times reported.

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