Alison Watt is widely regarded as one of the leading British painters working today, with work held in many important national and international collections including the National Portrait Gallery, London; the Arts Council Collection, London; the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh; U.S. Embassies Collection; and the Uffizi Gallery, Florence. Watt subsequently became well known for her paintings of figures, often female nudes, before beginning in the late 1990s to focus on the fabric which had previously acted as a prop or backdrop for her figures.

 

Although the human figure is no longer explicit in Watt’s work, it is often implied. More recently, her painting has focused upon the relationship between the genres of portraiture and still life, exploring the possible narratives around everyday objects.