b. 1976, Sydney
Lives and Works in Sydney, Australia
Oliver Watts is an artist and academic who works as a figurative painter primarily. He reworks genres: portrait, landscape, seascape and still life among others for contemporary purposes. Watts has a deep faith in the history and materiality of painting to tell prescient and pressing stories.
His work is broadly post-human and responds to various critiques to retell stories from literature and history. His work is often sensual and seductive and plays on the power of images from a broader visual culture.
Trained as an art historian and curator, Watts has consistently exhibited his paintings. He received his MFA from SCA in 2016 for a series entitled Cordelia/Fool which featured Eryn Jean Norvill as the main protagonist. Watts often uses actors to pose in his works and to collaborate as writers as well as models to help generate gestures and poses that animate the narratives. Watts was a lecturer at SCA between 2011–2017 and is now the Head Curator of Artbank.
He has been a finalist in many art prizes including the Archibald Prize (2021, 2023, 2024), the Glover Prize, the Helen Lempriere Travelling Scholarship, and the Brett Whiteley Travelling Scholarship, and is the recipient of the Noel Chettle Art Prize. He is held in the National Museum of Australia, Artbank and the Reserve Bank collections.
He was a founding member of the Chaser as a cartoonist and illustrator.
