James
F. Watkinson was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. From
the age of twelve to fifteen he worked there as an assistant
in the Geology Department of the Academy of Natural Sciences
among dioramas and display cases which were to have a
lasting effect on his artistic vision.
In
1962 he went to Duke University to continue a study of
geology but left in 1964 to join the Navy. During
a search and rescue tour overseas in 1966 he drew for
the first time.
After
leaving the service he entered Temple University as an
English major with literary intentions and no plan to
pursue visual art. During that time he explored
many abandoned buildings in which he found inspiration
and discovered what would later become art supplies. Employment
followed as a youth caseworker, pathology lab technician
and electrician. In the evenings he began experimenting
with collage and assemblage.
While
a carpenter in Vermont in 1975 he secured a job as Special
Instructor running the sculpture studio for the Art Department
at Dartmouth College. In 1978 he began exhibiting
with the Allan Stone Gallery and was included in the
1979 "30 Years of Box Construction" show
curated by Jeremy Stone in Boston.
In
1986 he worked and traveled in Western Europe for four
months where the ubiquitous ruins and ancient walls were
a profound inspiration to him. During the next
four years he returned briefly to construction work and
jobs as an in-hospital cameraman, orderly, and caseworker
on a psychiatric-medical unit.
He
began showing with the Cavin-Morris Gallery in 1988 and
had his first New York one person exhibition there in
1989. This was facilitated by an anonymous grant
of a two month fellowship to the Vermont Studio Colony
which proved to be critical in the preparation for that
show. Later that year he taught sculpture and 3-d
design at Goddard College for one semester as a Visiting
Professor.
In
January of 1994 Mr. Watkinson returned to France for
six months and had the good fortune to be offered a temporary
studio in which he began to paint for the first time.
In 1995 he set up a temporary workspace in Seattle where
his son, recently returned from several years in the
Czech Republic, was living. In the fall of that
year he entered a two-year MFA program in sculpture at
Alfred University.
After
graduation Mr. Watkinson moved to New York and later
established a studio in Brooklyn jointly with his son. He
began working as a preparator at the New Museum of Contemporary
Art in Manhattan in 1998. He maintained that job
but relocated briefly to Philadelphia where he also did
exhibition work at the Moore College of Art.
Mr.
Watkinson returned to New York in 1999. He continued
his work at the New Museum and shared a loft in Brooklyn
in which he focused on drawing, painting and digital
photomontage. He began showing this work with Dot galerie
of Geneva, Switzerland in 2001. His first solo
show with them was in Athens, Greece in 2002 followed
by a drawing exhibition in Geneva two years later.
In 2003 Mr. Watkinson returned to southern New Jersey
where he has been concentrating on drawing since that
time.
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