William Copley

William N. Copley (January 24, 1919 – May 7, 1996) also known as CPLY, was a painter, writer, gallerist, collector, patron, publisher and art entrepreneur. His works as an artist have been classified as late Surrealist and precursory to Pop Art.

Copley was born in New York City in 1919 and was adopted in 1921 by Ira C. Copley, owner of 16 newspaper companies in Chicago and San Diego. Ira C. Copley remarried after the death of his wife, Edith, several years after the adoption took place. The three lived in Aurora, Illinois, until Copley was ten years old whereby the family moved to Coronado Island, California

Copley was sent to Phillips Andover and then Yale University by his adopted parents. He was drafted in the war in the middle of his education at Yale, a decision negotiated by the school and the army. Copley experimented with politics upon returning home from the war, working as a reporter for his father's newspaper.

By 1946, Copley met and married Marjorie Doris Wead, the daughter of a test pilot for the Navy. Doris's sister was married to John Ployardt, an animator and narrator at Walt Disney Studios. Copley and Ployardt soon became friends and Ployardt began introducing Copley to painting and Surrealism. The two traveled to Mexico and New York, discovering art, meeting the artists behind the works, and grasping Surrealist ideas. It was during this time that Copley and Ployardt decided to open a gallery in Los Angeles to exhibit Surrealist works

Copley moved to Roxbury, Connecticut in 1980, where he built a studio and spent time among friends. In 1992 he moved full-time to Key West, Florida, due to health issues and lived with his sixth and final wife, Cynthia Gooch. He died on May 7, 1996, at age 77 from complications from a stroke he had suffered three weeks earlier.

Mr. Copley's first five marriages ended in divorce. In addition to his son, who is also a painter, he is survived by his wife, Cynthia Gooch; two daughters, Claire of Manhattan and Theodora of Ohio, and four grandchildren