This May 2022, Sadie Coles HQ presents a solo exhibition of drawings and a painting by the late American artist William N. Copley (1919-1996), also known as CPLY (pronounced see-ply). Copley was a self-taught artist whose stylised figuration combines elements of Pop Art and Surrealism, setting his work obliquely to the post-war abstraction of his peers. The exhibition brings together a body of work that explores the artist’s representations of sexuality in its many guises, through a series of vignettes depicting nude figures alone, in couples or groups in different settings. Ranging from the early 1960s, preceding his renowned X-Rated...
This May 2022, Sadie Coles HQ presents a solo exhibition of drawings and a painting by the late American artist William N. Copley (1919-1996), also known as CPLY (pronounced see-ply). Copley was a self-taught artist whose stylised figuration combines elements of Pop Art and Surrealism, setting his work
obliquely to the post-war abstraction of his peers. The exhibition brings together a body of work that explores the artist’s representations of sexuality in its many guises, through a series of vignettes depicting nude figures alone, in couples or groups in different settings. Ranging from the early 1960s, preceding his
renowned X-Rated paintings, up to the 1990s, the works reflect Copley’s distinct pop aesthetic in which sensuality, eroticism and humour coalesce.
William N. Copley (1919-1996) was a painter, gallerist, writer, publisher, arts patron and entrepreneur. From 1947-8 he
ran the Copley Galleries in Beverly Hills, exhibiting works by prominent European and American Surrealist artists.
Encouraged by Man Ray, Max Ernst and Marcel Duchamp, his first solo exhibition as a painter took place at Roger’s Bookshop, Los Angeles, in 1946. In the years that followed he had numerous solo exhibition in the USA and Europe, and in 1981 a travelling retrospective toured to Kunsthalle Bern, Centre Georges Pompidou and Stedelijk Van Abbesmuseum. In addition he participated in seminal group exhibitions including documenta 5 (1972) and documenta 7 (1982). Copley’s work has subsequently been exhibited internationally and is now held in public and private collections worldwide. Most recently major solo exhibitions have included The Coffin They Carry You Off In, ICA – Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami (2018); Candice Breitz: Sex work. In dialogue with works by William N. Copley from The
Frieder Burda Collection, Museum Frieder Burda | Salon Berlin, Berlin (2018); Fondazione Prada, Milan (2016); The World According to CPLY, The Menil Collection, Houston (2016) and Frieda Burder Museum, Baden Baden (2012); and William N. Copley & Andreas Slominski – X-RATED, a dual exhibition presented at the me Collectors Room, Berlin (2011).
