Scott Watson (Canadian, b. 1950) is Director Emeritus and Research Fellow at the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, University of British Columbia. A curator whose career has spanned more than thirty-five years, Watson is internationally recognized for his research and work in curatorial and exhibition studies, contemporary art and issues, and art theory and criticism. His distinctions include the Hnatyshyn Foundation Award for Curatorial Excellence in Contemporary Art (2010); the Alvin Balkind Award for Creative Curatorship in BC Arts (2008) and the UBC Dorothy Somerset Award for Performance Development in the Visual and Performing Arts (2005). Watson has published extensively in the areas of contemporary Canadian and international art. His 1990 monograph on Jack Shadbolt earned the Hubert Evans Non-Fiction Prize in 1991. Recent publications include Letters: Michael Morris and Concrete Poetry (2015); Thrown: British Columbia’s Apprentices of Bernard Leach and their Contemporaries (2011), a finalist for the 2012 Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize; “Race, Wilderness, Territory and the Origins of the Modern Canadian Landscape” and “Disfigured Nature” (in Beyond Wilderness, McGill University Press, 2007); and “Transmission Difficulties: Vancouver Painting in the 1960s” (in Paint, Vancouver Art Gallery, 2006).
Our summer exhibition, Here and There featured works by important artists whose artwork has recently entered into the permanent collection through donation or purchase by the Belkin Art Gallery. The show highlighted artistic practices occurring on both a local and global scale while simultaneously drawing attention to the diverse nature and composition of the collection.
In the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s, Kate Craig invoked the then avant-garde strategies of collaboration, performance and persona to redefine artistic practice in Vancouver. The exhibit featured archival photographs and the Flying Leopard Costume worn by Craig in her performances and videos. Performances on video of Cuban artist Tania Bruguera’s Head Down (Western Front, 1997) and American Andrea Fraser’s Official Welcome (Belkin Art Gallery, 2002) were also presented for viewing.
A number of works installed for Here and There had not been exhibited in Vancouver. These included the large-scale inkjet print, AA Breakfast by Turner Prize winner Wolfgang Tillmans, who is known for his photographs of fashion, friends and the famous; and photo-based sculptures from the series Canadian Softwood by Toronto artist Alan Belcher. In addition, pieces by Vancouver based artists Laiwan and Sam Shem, Kevin Madill, Al McWilliams and Ron Terada will be shown. Drawings by Cuban artist Chago and American painter Russell FitzGerald highlight the ongoing evolution and international scope that characterizes the Belkin’s collection, one of the largest public collections in British Columbia. We gratefully acknowledge the Canada Council for the Arts for their support.
Scott Watson (Canadian, b. 1950) is Director Emeritus and Research Fellow at the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, University of British Columbia. A curator whose career has spanned more than thirty-five years, Watson is internationally recognized for his research and work in curatorial and exhibition studies, contemporary art and issues, and art theory and criticism. His distinctions include the Hnatyshyn Foundation Award for Curatorial Excellence in Contemporary Art (2010); the Alvin Balkind Award for Creative Curatorship in BC Arts (2008) and the UBC Dorothy Somerset Award for Performance Development in the Visual and Performing Arts (2005). Watson has published extensively in the areas of contemporary Canadian and international art. His 1990 monograph on Jack Shadbolt earned the Hubert Evans Non-Fiction Prize in 1991. Recent publications include Letters: Michael Morris and Concrete Poetry (2015); Thrown: British Columbia’s Apprentices of Bernard Leach and their Contemporaries (2011), a finalist for the 2012 Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize; “Race, Wilderness, Territory and the Origins of the Modern Canadian Landscape” and “Disfigured Nature” (in Beyond Wilderness, McGill University Press, 2007); and “Transmission Difficulties: Vancouver Painting in the 1960s” (in Paint, Vancouver Art Gallery, 2006).
Canada Council for the Arts