Will Cotton Quotes

In a gallery, there's an expectation of high prices and a somewhat elitist atmosphere.

Failures in art usually lead to something else interesting.

In terms of the class structure that you see so much in European portraiture, I don't think one feels that in America in the 21st century. But we have these other kinds of social structures now, like celebrity, who establish new hierarchies.

As an artist, it's possible to get tired of yourself.

When I first started painting candyland imagery, I was looking for the best possible metaphor for everything that is pleasure, desire and insatiability.

Smells are so powerful and evocative, sometimes stronger than visual cues.

The goal of art-making in general is communication.

I can go to parties all the time and not see people I want to work with, but then sometimes I do, and the way I try to describe it is that I like to refer to art history a lot in my paintings, and there are some people who just have a face that feels like art historical. Like they could be in a Tiepolo painting as a person riding through the sky in a chariot, or she could be in a fashion magazine.

People's love of sweets and guilty feelings about overindulgence are pretty universal.

There's something of a painting of a woman that represents all women - and by extension, all of humanity - that I just find very exciting. It's a nice distillation, I think, of what it means to be alive.