Kouros Gallery is pleased to present an exhibition of collage paintings by the renowned master collagist, Fred Otnes.

Otnes’ collage paintings are works of subtle, mysterious and refined beauty, combining art historical references ranging from the ancient Greeks to Modernism. Inspired by several cubist masters, including Picasso and Kurt Schwitters, Otnes pioneered a singular style of precise photo transfer and collage techniques that merge with chance as to appear inevitable and eternal.

Born in 1930 in Junction City, Kansas, Otnes trained at the Art Institute of Chicago, where he first encountered Cubist works by Braque and Picasso. The Modernist commitment to form without the illusion of depth captured his imagination, though it would be some time before he incorporated it into his own work. He first pursued a career in traditional, realistic illustration in Chicago, and then, from 1953, in New York, working for national magazines and advertising clients.

Otnes is the winner of over 200 awards, including Gold and Silver Medals from the Museum of American Illustration and The New York Art Directors Club, and his works are in many prominent public and private collections, including the National Academy of Science, Washington, DC; Twentieth Century Fox, Los Angeles, Calif.; National Geographic Society, Washington, DC, among many others. His commissioned illustrations include 16 United States Postal Stamps, Short Stories of Guy de Maupassant – Franklin Library, and multiple covers of the Atlantic Monthly.

A monograph containing 237 pages and over 135 color plates, with an essay by Jill Bossert, is available.