Natalie Urquhart BEM

Natalie Urquhart is the Director of the National Gallery of the Cayman Islands. She holds an MA in Art History, and Arts Policy and Management, and has over twenty years’ experience in the cultural sector specialising in strategic and policy development, collections management, and curatorial programming.

Urquhart is a past president of the Museums Association of the Caribbean (2017-2020) and a representative for their ICOM affiliated member committee. She has formally served as a core committee member of the Tilting Axis Caribbean arts alliance, the Nationals Arts & Culture Awards Committee, the Cayman Islands National Cultural Policy Committee, as well as contributing to working committees for UNESCO, the EULAC Foundation, and others. She currently serves as a an ICOM UK Trustee, a Project Advisor for the Shared Islands Stories Project (University of St Andrews), and as the Founder/Creative Director for Cayman Art Week.

Urquhart a leading authority on Caymanian art and author of the islands’ first formal art history. Her own curatorial research explores the influence of traditional cultural heritage and memory on contemporary art practice in the Cayman Islands and wider region. This work has formed the basis of innovative exhibitions that bridge the historical and the contemporary.

She is the recipient of several National Awards for her work and was recognised in the 2022 Queen’s New Year Honours list with a British Empire Medal for her contribution to arts and culture in the Cayman Islands and wider region.