Cotys Winston-Sandefur
Born and raised in Oakland, CA, Cotys Winston-Sandefur first found art by copying their older sister’s drawings. In their eyes, she was the best artist in the world, and her animals and flowers became the first models for Cotys’s hand. When asked what they wanted to be growing up, Cotys always answered the same: “A Veterinarian/Artist.” For a while, the veterinary path won out—they studied at UC Davis and worked at the school’s veterinary hospital—until the work made it clear that this environment wasn’t for them. A painting class with professor Bea Parsons shifted everything, opening up clarity about the future and giving permission to let the other half of their childhood dream take the wheel. Cotys graduated with a BA in Art from UC Davis, went on to earn an MFA from Maharishi International University, and today teaches as an art professor while exhibiting nationally, from the Oak Park Art Gallery in Chicago to the Consulate General of Mexico in Los Angeles.
Cotys’s work reflects a belief in the transformative power of art and the subconscious. Using charcoal and collage, they draw on books, podcasts, and scientific videos as indirect influences, weaving patterns from both the natural and unseen worlds. A pocket microscope becomes a portal to bugs, plant cells, and fibers; deep-sea exploration videos inspire a sense of the unknown. Their grief, too, has become inseparable from the work. After losing their mother to cancer in 2023, Cotys found themselves searching for ways to bridge realms—between physical and spiritual, life and death, the microcosm and the macrocosm. That search deepened their exploration of depth on both two- and three-dimensional levels, with collages expanding across walls, forming portals as a way to process loss and reach toward understanding.
Influenced by artists like James Siena and Wangechi Mutu, Cotys balances precision and intuition. Siena’s intricate, rule-based methods resonate with the disciplined patterns of charcoal, while Mutu’s layered collages and organic storytelling echo in Cotys’s explorations of depth and meaning. Recurring motifs such as circles and bodily, organic forms embody their dual role as both observer and outsider: peering through microscopes at hidden worlds, or reaching through art to glimpse what might lie beyond this one.
The process itself feels medicinal. Cotys begins with dense charcoal—lines, shades, velvety textures pressed to the limit of breaking—before translating those drawings into collages. Photographs of patterns are reprinted, scaled, cut into fluid shapes, then arranged according to the organic “growth” of the pattern itself. Over time, these collages have expanded outward, sometimes intuitively resisting earlier methods. “It almost feels like being used,” they explain. “Like I’m just a vessel in which the pieces are putting themselves together.”
Their work carries a message that is not always explicit but is always present: exploring life and death, the conscious and subconscious, and the spaces that connect us. While the meaning may shift in translation for each viewer, the work is designed to hold space for immersion, healing, and reflection.
Looking forward, Cotys plans to continue experimenting with depth, installations, and collaborations—especially between art and science, which they see as siblings. “Finding collaborations out of your main medium is a great way to expand your process,” they say. “You never know how something might inspire you.”
