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This collaboration utilizes the direct gravure process to create a 3-run, 7-color print. Cotton composed a layered illustration on acetate, which was exposed to generate three separate plates. Each plate was printed à la poupée, with careful hand application of color, to balance ink densities and preserve the fine lines of the final plate.
Born in 1965 in the USA, Will Cotton lives and works in New York. He belongs to a generation of American painters who have taken figurative painting in an entirely new direction. In his studio, Cotton constructs giant confectionery-based assemblages, such as gingerbread houses, cake mountains, and chocolate seas, opening the door to the creation of a new utopian reality. His works explore the notions of temptation and excess.
Cotton’s recent paintings and drawings of cowboys, unicorns, and mermaids, presented in the Templon New York exhibition “Between Instinct and Reason” depict fantasy realms that transcend Hollywood fairy tales. His trident-wielding mermaids appear as manipulative narcissists and seductive sirens who lure macho Marlboro men, when not attempting to tame wild unicorns, to their demise. Cotton casts his characters into dreamlike, confection-filled scenes reminiscent of a decadent “Venetian Hour”.
