Selected Writings

Essays and conversations from the unclassifiable American advocate for surrealism and predecessor of pop art, William N. Copley

For readers interested in the extraordinary life, work, and artistic milieu of the great American surrealist and proto-pop painter William Nelson Copley (1919-96), this volume will come as a thrilling revelation and a long-awaited peek into the mind of one of 20th-century art's most influential yet least recognized protagonists.

Though best known for his radical work as a painter--which he pursued under the name CPLY--Copley was also a talented writer and the texts gathered here present his most significant essays, articles and conversations. Among Copley's reflections on art and artists is "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dealer," a vividly humorous account of his brief tenure as a dealer in surrealist art in 1940s Los Angeles. Also included are key interviews and correspondence illuminating Copley's own practice and a selection of his newspaper articles, originally published in the 1950s and reprinted now for the first time.