Shane Cotton was born in 1964 in Upper Hutt, New Zealand, and is of Ngati Rangi, Ngati Hine and Te Uri Taniwha descent. His Maori heritage is located in New Zealand's Northland. Graduating in 1991 with a Fine Arts Degree and Diploma in Teaching from the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, Cotton taught at Massey University in the Maori Visual Arts Programme from 1993-2003.

Landscape references in Cotton's early paintings recall the symmetry of Maori carving and the work of Colin McCahon. Simple images, sepia-coloured and scaled metaphorically, derive from nineteenth-century Maori Folk Art, which Cotton perceives as signifiers of Maori culture cleverly veiled within a Christian context. Op and Pop appropriations, Maori Biblical text and, after 2000, brightly coloured targets, preserved heads (moko mokai), birds, fluoro wands and majestic cliffs infused with human presence appear in his work. Most recently, Cotton is interested in exploring the effects of spatial relationships in picturing change.