Dominic Watson makes life-size figurative sculptures from clay, paper mâché, and other reclaimed materials, exploring the visceral and grotesque qualities of the human body. Rendered in a crude, cartoonish style, his work employs humour and satire as tools to probe the absurdity of existing in contemporary Britain, with greed, consumption, and the vitriolic nature of public discourse recurring as central themes.
At the conceptual heart of his practice, Watson twists narratives drawn from English histories and mythologies, developing a visual language that subverts the traditions of caricature. Working across a range of materials, he exaggerates and distorts the human form to build these narratives - resulting in figures that are life-sized, often fragmented, and equally absurd as they are unsettling.
Most recently, he constructed a life-sized galleon, its structure conceived as a single decaying body. Built from the damp, warped timber of salvaged children's playhouses, the galleon stands as a fragile portrait of an England adrift where fagmented crew figures revel in the grotesque as a direct response to a fractured political and cultural landscape. In this way, the galleon extends Watson's broader interest in national nostalgia and the more sinister undertow lurking behind its fairy-tale fictions.
Dominic Watson lives and works in Margate. Recent solo and duo exhibitions include Vinegar & Piss, The Sunday Painter, London, UK (2026); Cucumber Season, Strange Cargo Arts, Folkestone, UK (2025); God Bless Strawberry Jam Cob Gallery, London, UK (2023); “Goody-Goody” Lumpsome, St Chads, London, UK (2023); Death By The Sea, Quench Gallery, Margate, UK (2021); The Steak Eaters, Proudick, London, UK (2019); Stunning Contemporary, Syracuse University, New York, US (2016). Group exhibitions include Testament, Goldsmiths CCA, London, UK (2022); Balls, OOF Gallery, London , UK (2022); Plymouth Contemporary, KARST, Plymouth, UK (2017); CURRENT: Contemporary Art from Scotland in Shanghai, Duolun Museum, Shanghai, China (2016); Pandiculate! The Joy of Stretching, The Koppel Project, London, UK (2016); London Open, Whitechapel Gallery, London, (2015); Wearing Potentiality, Paradise Row, London, UK (2014); New Contemporaries, Spike Island, Bristol, UK (2013); New Contemporaries, ICA London, UK (2013).