Scott Watson (curator)


Scott Watson is a Canadian curator, writer, and researcher based in Vancouver, British Columbia. Watson was the Director/Curator of the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery at the University of British Columbia from 1995 to 2021. As faculty in the Department of Art History, Visual Art and Theory at the University of British Columbia, he helped initiate the Critical Curatorial Studies program at UBC in September 2002. Through his research and publications, he has acted as a champion of contemporary Vancouver artists.

Career

Watson was trained in art history and received his BA and MA at UBC. He was initially a fiction writer and published two books, "Stories" and "Platonic Love". In 1980, he was hired by the Vancouver Art Gallery. In 1985, he curated the Young Romantics painting exhibition and in 1990, published a monograph on Jack Shadbolt. In 1989, he was hired by the University of British Columbia gallery. In 1995, he became the first director/curator of the gallery. He retired in 2021.

Curatorial projects and research

Watson's research and curation focuses primarily around topics related to contemporary art, art theory and criticism, twentieth-century art history, and curatorial studies. His curatorial projects have appeared across Canada including at the Vancouver Art Gallery, Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, and Artspeak in Vancouver and internationally in Berlin, Antwerp, and London.

Notable curatorial projects

Queer Landscapes at ArtspeakThrown: Influences and Intentions of West Coast Ceramics

Selected publications

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Awards and honours