Will Cotton
After studying at The Cooper Union and the New York Academy of Art in New York City, Will Cotton (1965–) evolved a painting style wherein landscapes are formed from sweet confections and baked creations, and are interspersed with people. Cotton bakes the materials that he then uses in his paintings. The results, carefully painted but with a slight blur, as if seen through clouded glass, are not the trite subject matter of chocolate boxes, but rather grand-style portraits. Cotton is interested in the way that most cultures all over the world seem to engage in some process of self-adornment. His work has been interpreted as a criticism of the greed and the overindulgence of American society, as well as a contemporary re-imagination of traditional genres such as landscape and portraiture.
Will Cotton has exhibited throughout the United States and Europe, including the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA; the Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, Washington; the Kunsthalle Bielefeld, Bielefeld, Germany; the Hudson River Museum, Yonkers, New York; the Triennale di Milano, Milan, Italy; the Musée Marmottan Monet, Paris, France; and the Orlando Museum of Art, Orlando, Florida. His work is in the collections of the Seattle Art Museum, Washington; the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC; and the Columbus Museum of Art, Columbus, Ohio. Will Cotton was awarded an honorary Doctorate from the New York Academy of Art where he was a senior critic in 2012.
