William N. Copley

William N. Copley

William N. Copley - Galerie Max Hetzler Selected Works
Related Links

William N. Copley (1919-1996), is celebrated today for his unique contribution to post-war painting, providing a singular connection between European Surrealism and American Pop Art. With subjects ranging from everyday objects such as umbrellas, flags and cars, to universal morality tales, exploring themes of love, adultery and death, Copley gave form to his fantasies and fetishes through strong black outlines and a self-taught, figurative style. Not only a painter, but a writer, gallerist, collector, publisher, and patron to the arts, his colourful, animated works abound with playful, baroque patterns, visual puns, and bawdy ballads, combining politics, sex and satire, under one style, and one signature: CPLY.

“The visual vocabulary of Copley begins with the verb “I love” and from there it leads through colourful adjectives and staccato interjections to the great crossword puzzle in which words and images simmer together in a process of distillation. Copley, the cordon bleu in all questions of erotic chemistry, stirs into his pot the right ingredients of humour, black as the guillotine and the grand piano, red white and blue as the flag as underwear, a rainbow in fact that terminates in a pot de chambre. His insight into life, which goes beyond his enjoyment even of its absurdities, gives him the vision to express himself as a painter, that is a poet in visual imagery.”

R. Penrose, ‘William Nelson Copley’, first published on the occasion of an exhibition at the Galleria Arturo Schwarz, Milan, 1962, as reprinted in William N. Copley. Heed, Greed, Trust, Lust, exh.cat., Hannover: Kestner-Gesellschaft, 1995, p. 201.

Image: Battle of the Sexes No. 2, 1974, acrylic on cotton, 160.2 x 286.4 cm.; 63 1/8 x 112 3/4 in.; 161.7 x 288 x 4.5 cm.; 63 5/8 x 113 3/8 x 1 3/4 in. (framed)

Selected Works

Palladium, 1959–1963

Blue Mood, 1964

Oh, He Rang The Bell And Whistled...And Then He Said, "Good Morning To You Jack", But He Little Knew The Sorrow That He Brought Me When He Handed Me A Letter Edged In Black (from "The Letter Edged in Black", author unknown), 1966
View All

Solo Exhibitions

WILLIAM N. COPLEY - Galerie Max Hetzler

Autoeroticism, 1984

ONLINE VIEWING ROOM

6 – 20 June 2020
William N. Copley - Galerie Max Hetzler

The Ballad of William N. Copley

Bleibtreustraße 45, Berlin

17 January – 7 March 2020

Group Exhibitions

FIAC at the gallery - Galerie Max Hetzler

FIAC at the gallery

Ai Weiwei, Darren Almond, Giulia Andreani, Louise Bonnet, André Butzer, William N. Copley, Jeremy Demester, Ida Ekblad, Günther Förg, Charles Gaines, Loris Gréaud, Raymond Hains, Raphaela Simon, Tursic & Mille

57, rue du Temple, Paris

22 – 31 October 2020
Karel Appel, André Butzer, William N. Copley, Ida Ekblad, Jeff Elrod, Walton Ford, Tursic & Mille - Galerie Max Hetzler

Karel Appel, André Butzer, William N. Copley, Ida Ekblad, Jeff Elrod, Walton Ford, Tursic & Mille

41 Dover Street, London

1 – 19 September 2020
Summer Show - Galerie Max Hetzler

Summer Show

Giulia Andreani, William N. Copley, Jeff Elrod, Günther Förg, Albert Oehlen, Sigmar Polke, Bridget Riley, Julian Schnabel, Thomas Struth, Edmund de Waal

Bleibtreustraße 45, Berlin

12 June – 1 August 2020

Selected Institutional Exhibitions

William N. Copley: The Coffin They Carry You Off In

William N. Copley: The Coffin They Carry You Off In

Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami

4 December 2018 – 12 May 2019
William N. Copley

William N. Copley

Fondazione Prada, Milan

20 October 2016 – 12 February 2017

Biography

Show Vita
Show Selected Bibliography

Videos

Adam Pendleton

Interview: Theodora Copley

filmed on the occasion of the exhibition "WILLIAM N. COPLEY - The Ballad of William N. Copley"

Bleibtreustraße 45, Berlin

17 January 2020

Publications

William N. Copley, The Ballad of William N. Copley - Galerie Max Hetzler

William N. Copley, The Ballad of William N. Copley

Exhibition Poster
2020
Edition of 100

€ 20.00

Selected Press

ArtReview March 2020

frieze Magazine March 2020

Mousse Magazine 2016

east of borneo January 2014

News

William N. Copley et al.

Closer to Life: Drawings and Works on Paper in the Marieluise Hessel Collection (group show)
CCS Bard galleries, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY
26 June – 17 October 2021

CCS Bard celebrates its 30th anniversary with Closer to Life, an exhibition of over forty artists of drawings and works on paper from the Marieluise Hessel Collection.

The exhibition of over 75 drawings and works on paper spans more than four decades of collecting by philanthropist, Marieluise ...

William N. Copley, Raymond Hains et al.

Impasse Ronsin. Murder, Love, and Art in the Heart of Paris (group show)
Museum Tinguely, Basel
16 December 2020 – 29 August 2021

Impasse Ronsin, a dead-end street in the midst of Paris's Montparnasse district, was a unique artists' colony, known for more than a century as a place of art, contemplation, conversation, celebration, innovation, creation and destruction. With Impasse Ronsin. Murder, Love and Art in the Heart of ...
William N. Copley, Raymond Hains