Osmond Watson (13 June 1934 – 15 November 2005) was a
Jamaica
Jamaica is an island country in the Caribbean Sea and the West Indies. At , it is the third-largest island—after Cuba and Hispaniola—of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean. Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, west of Hispaniola (the is ...
n painter and sculptor.
Biography
Born in
Kingston
Kingston may refer to:
Places
* List of places called Kingston, including the six most populated:
** Kingston, Jamaica
** Kingston upon Hull, England
** City of Kingston, Victoria, Australia
** Kingston, Ontario, Canada
** Kingston upon Thames, ...
, Jamaica, Watson attended art classes at the Institute of Jamaica's Junior Centre from 1948 until 1952; from that year until 1958 he attended the
Jamaica School of Art and Crafts
Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts, (formerly Jamaica School of Art and Crafts), is an art school in Kingston, Jamaica. In 1940, Edna Manley pioneered evening art classes at the Institute of Jamaica's Junior Centre but it wa ...
(JSAC) in Kingston. He began exhibiting, with some success, in his home country, but decided to go to
London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
in 1961 for further study at St Martin's School of Art; there he remained until 1965, becoming acquainted as well with the collections of the
British Museum
The British Museum is a Museum, public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is the largest in the world. It documents the story of human cu ...
.
His style changed somewhat after his return from England; his mature work was marked by the influence of
African art
African art encompasses modern and historical paintings, sculptures, installations, and other visual cultures originating from indigenous African diaspora, African communities across the African continent. The definition may also include the ar ...
, particularly of the
Yoruba people
The Yoruba people ( ; , , ) are a West African ethnic group who inhabit parts of Nigeria, Benin, and Togo, which are collectively referred to as Yorubaland. The Yoruba constitute more than 50 million people in Africa, are over a million outsid ...
, and
cubism
Cubism is an early-20th-century avant-garde art movement which began in Paris. It revolutionized painting and the visual arts, and sparked artistic innovations in music, ballet, literature, and architecture.
Cubist subjects are analyzed, broke ...
. Much of his subject matter was drawn from Jamaican society, including the
Junkanoo
Junkanoo (also Jonkonnu) is a festival that originated during the period of African chattel slavery in British American colonies. It is practiced most notably in The Bahamas, Jamaica and Belize, and historically in North Carolina and Miami, w ...
festival and the
Rastafari movement
Rastafari is an Abrahamic religion that developed in Jamaica during the 1930s. It is classified as both a new religious movement and a social movement by scholars of religion. There is no central authority in control of the movement and much ...
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...