Shane Cotton | |
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.jpg) Cotton in 2019 | |
| Born | Shane William Cotton 3 October 1965 Upper Hutt, New Zealand |
| Education | Ilam School of Fine Arts |
| Occupation | Artist |
Shane William Cotton ONZM (born 3 October 1964) is a New Zealand painter whose work explores biculturalism, colonialism, cultural identity, Māori spirituality, and life and death. He is a registered Toi Iho artist.
Cotton was born in Upper Hutt with Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Rangi, Ngāti Hine and Te Uri Taniwha iwi affiliations (his father a member of the Ngāpuhi iwi and his mother European). His home marae is at Ngāwhā, near Kaikohe. Cotton studied at the Ilam School of Fine Arts in Christchurch, graduating in 1988. He met his wife, Luanne, who is an architect, at art school. Cotton went on to gain a Diploma of Education from Christchurch College of Education and worked as a teacher. He lectured at Massey University, Palmerston North, in the Māori visual arts programme from 1993 until 2005 when he left to concentrate on his art practice full-time.
Cotton's early works, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, were abstract paintings depicting biomorphic forms. While doing research for his job at Massey University, he learned of Māori folk art, such as the painted decorations that combined Māori and Pākehā (European) motifs in meeting houses associated with Te Kooti, the 19th-century religious leader. In 1993 he started painting sepia-toned works that took inspiration from those in the late 19th-century buildings, such as the Rongopai meeting house at Waituhi, near Gisborne. In these he explored "colonial and post-colonial" "Māori and Pākehā cultural histories". Works from this period include a 17-metre-tall painting that was commissioned for SkyCity Auckland, which opened in 1996; the painting is now in SkyCity's International Convention Centre, which opened in 2026.
Cotton received both the Frances Hodgkins Fellowship and the Seppelt Contemporary Art Award from the Sydney Museum of Contemporary Art in 1998. His work was translated into a stained glass installation in St Joseph's Church, in Mt Victoria, Wellington, which opened in 2004. He was the New Zealand representative in the 2005 Prague Biennale. By 2007 he had been exhibited at many leading galleries in Australia and New Zealand, as well as in Spain. His work was included in the 17th Biennale of Sydney 2010. In 2015 Cotton was commissioned by the Australian War Memorial to make a print to commemorate the ANZAC Centenary.
Cotton's work includes Māori iconography and culture, such as shrunken heads, mokomokai, and native birds such as tūī, and European symbols and items. His paintings have explored questions of colonialism, cultural identity, Māori spirituality, and life and death. Describing his practice, Cotton said in 2012, "Biculturalism, how our histories have been interwoven over time, things that have come out of that connection – culture, politics, societal living – have been the driving factors in my work."
In 2008, he received a Laureate Award from the New Zealand Arts Foundation. He was appointed an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to the visual arts, in the 2012 Queen's Birthday and Diamond Jubilee Honours.
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