Donald Roller Wilson (b. 1938) Cookie... Seen Here; All Things Existing in Her Mind as Grains of Mustard Seeds; Compacted; and Ready to be Watered..., 2025 Oil on linen with artist's frame 38 x 16 ines (96.5 x 40.6 cm) (overall) Signed and dated along left edge: Donald Roller Wilson - 2025/04 (heart) PROVENANCE: Private collection, Fayetteville, Arkansas. Donald Roller Wilson's Cookie... Seen Here; All Things Existing in Her Mind as Grains of Mustard Seeds; Compacted; and Ready to be Watered... (2025) features Cookie, a wide-eyed baby orangutan and one of the artist's most beloved recurring characters. Wilson is known for his highly detailed, surrealist paintings of animals dressed in period clothing, and Cookie belongs to a larger cast of figures that feel less like subjects and more like personalities with their own lives and stories. Here, Cookie is presented in the style of a seventeenth-century portrait, complete with a ruff collar, composed pose, and carefully controlled light. The technique is meticulous and rooted in traditional painting methods, while the subject introduces a childlike, slightly absurd twist that makes the work immediately engaging. That blend of high and low is central to Wilson's appeal. You might be drawn in by how cute Cookie is, but her direct, slightly self-aware gaze adds just enough strangeness to complicate the scene. As with much of Wilson's work, the characters attract us, and then something odd about them keeps us looking a little longer. Works featuring Cookie are among the most sought after, and many have exceeded or even doubled their estimates. Because of the artist's careful, time-intensive process and the strong attachment collectors form to these paintings, relatively few works come to market. When they do, they are surprisingly hard to resist. You might start flipping through an auction catalog and end up impulsively adopting an orangutan. HID12401132022 © 2026 Heritage Auctions | All Rights Reserved www.HA.com/TexasAuctioneerLicenseNotice

Private collection, Fayetteville, Arkansas.

Presents very well. Faint pencil line along left edge, inherent to the artist's process. UV examined.
Framed Dimensions 38 X 16 ines