A man of many parts, Roger McDonald wove the different threads of his life together when he became a freelance curator. He said: "One of the triggers for me was helping organize an exhibition as part of UK98 at Kiyosato. I brought over some fiery young artists from England, and that experience showed me a way I could used my skills. Curating seemed very much related to wider society. In involves money-raising, business knowledge, economic research. You have to write texts for catalogs, deal with the media and TV. It is very rounded."
Born in Tokyo in 1971, Roger is the elder son of Fumiko and Chris McDonald, OBE, president of Rolex Japan Ltd. Roger credits his mother for keeping his Japanese language alive after he went, at age 8, to boarding school in England. He counts his fluency in Japanese as one of his most important qualifications.
Roger didn't know what he wanted to do in life, but he was blessed with a questing mind. He chose to study international relations and politics for his degree course at the University of Wales. "My time there provided me with a real sense of thinking about politics in life and work," he said. After earning his bachelor's degree in economics, he took a certificate in peace studies at the European University in Austria. "That is a recognized field of study, related to international politics," he said. "It was logical to want to go into that kind of area. I really wanted to know why people go to war. I found myself reading more on religion." He enrolled in the University of Kent, Canterbury, to take his master's degree in mysticism and religious experience. "I focused on Buddhism, the Zen tradition, and spent a couple of summers in monasteries in Japan."