Gary Dufour

Gary Dufour
Born	1954 (1954) Tisdale, Saskatchewan
Education	Fine Art, BFA (Distinction), University of Regina; Fine Art (grad. 1976); MFA, Nova Scotia College of Art and Design University (grad. 1979);
Known for	Curator of Contemporary Art, educator
Spouse	spouse of Siné MacPherson (b. 1954)

Gary Dufour (born 1954) is an art historian based in Australia who has taught at the University of Western Australia. He served as the senior curator at the Vancouver Art Gallery (1988–1995) and as chief curator and deputy director of the Art Gallery of Western Australia (1995–2013). He is most interested in contemporary and modern art and, in 2016, was appointed as an approved valuer for the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.

Career

Dufour was born in Tisdale, Saskatchewan. He received his BFA in Fine Art from the University of Regina, graduating in 1976, and his MFA at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design University, graduating in 1979.

In 1983, he became the Curator of Prints & Drawings at the Art Gallery of Western Australia in Perth, from 1987 to 1988, he was back in Canada in Regina, Saskatchewan, then from 1988 to 1995, he was Senior Curator at the Vancouver Art Gallery, Afterwards, from 1995 to 2013, he served as Chief Curator | Deputy Director at the Art Gallery of Western Australia. During this time, in 2007, he was the first curator-in-residence ISCP, New York for the Dr. K. David Edwards and Margery Edwards Charitable Trust. From 2013 to 2020, he taught Art History at the University of Western Australia and from 2013 to 2018, he directed the Cruthers Art Foundation (the Cruthers Collection of Women's Art (CCWA) is Australia's largest public collection of women's art). In 2016, he was appointed an approved valuer for the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program.

Dufour has developed extensive contemporary international art collections and commissioned artists such as Christian Boltanski. His Fonds is held at the National Art Archive and Capon Research Library, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney and in the "Papers of Howard Taylor" at the Archives and Research Library, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra.

Writing

Dufour edited the State art collection : Art Gallery of Western Australia (1997). He has organized, co-organized or contributed essays to exhibitions and books on the art of International modern and contemporary artists such as Howard Taylor (1985), Frank Nulf (1987), Dan Graham (1985), Max Pam (1986), Jochen Gerz (1994), and most famously, Jeff Wall (1990 and 2012), among others. (Dufour edited Wall's Catalogue Raisonné: 2005-2021, called a "lavish presentation" by Goodreads). In 2024, he wrote articles about Morris Louis and Kenneth Noland for the Post-War & Contemporary Art catalogue, Heffel Fine Art Auction House in Canada.