Will Reader has long been recognized in southern Ohio for his exquisitely rendered and quietly evocative portrayals of the Portsmouth urbanscape and the southern Ohio landscape. His works are realistically painted and yet reductively composed. Will’s work has been recognized the by Southern Ohio Museum, which has had four exhibitions of his work, including one in 2004 in conjunction with Alan Gough. His work has also been included in two significant exhibitions in 2014 and 2015 at the Ohio Arts Council’s Riffe Gallery, entitled The Urban Landscape: A Tale of Grandeur and Abandonment and A Century of Ohio Watercolor, which traveled to the Southern Ohio Museum, as well.

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Elizabeth Trapp, critic for the Columbus Dispatch, stated pertaining to his work in the Urban Landscape exhibition “His style, tight and immaculate, is at odds with the images of neglect he pictures.” This statement captures the duality of Reader’s subtly sophisticated work.