Donald Cuthbert Locke was born in the West Coast Demerara village of Stewartville, and began painting in 1947 under ER Burrowes, MBE.
Locke was awarded a British Council Scholarship in 1954, and studied at Bath Academy of Art in Wiltshire, England. In 1959 he was awarded a Guyana Government Award to Edinburgh University, Scotland.
He returned home to become involved in the Independence artists of the era before migrating from Guyana in 1970.
It is said that he became disillusioned with the British art scene and arrived in the United States in 1979 when he was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in Sculpture. He was artist-in-Residence at Arizona State University for one year; becoming a permanent resident in 1980.
After working as a correspondent as well as an art critic for several years in Southwest US, Locke returned to painting in 1989, and moved to Atlanta in 1990.
For five years he was one of the resident studio artists at the Atlanta Contemporary Arts Center, and a member of the part-time faculty at Georgia State University and Atlanta College of Art.
He retired from teaching in 1996. For three years he wrote a weekly review for Creative Loafing, Atlanta and was a member of the Advisory Board of Art Papers.
