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Born in Glasgow, Colvin has exhibited his work nationally and internationally for over thirty years since graduating from the Royal College of Art in 1985. Trained at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art, Dundee, Diploma in Sculpture between 1979 and 1983 and then obtained an MA in photography at the Royal College of Art in London between 1983 and 1985. He was a winner of one of the first Scottish Arts Council Creative Scotland Awards from which he created the acclaimed exhibition for the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Ossian, Fragments of Ancient Poetry, in 2001. His work often references iconic art works and cultural figures. In the same year he was awarded an OBE and he is Professor of Fine Art Photography and Associate Dean at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, Dundee. His works have been widely exhibited in venues as diverse as Orkney, Los Angeles and Ecuador, and are represented in numerous collections including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Museum of Fine Art, Houston; The Tate Gallery, London; and the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art. Colvin became an Associate Member of the RSA in 2004 and an Academician in 2005. The text of the Scottish Society for the History of Photography's Annual Photographer's Lecture, for 1997, titled "The Alchemical Canvas" and given by Colvin, is transcribed in the Society's Journal for 1997, a copy of which is held in the RSA Library (L.J.2016.0043). The transcript of an earlier interview with the artist appears in the Scottish Society of the History of Photography's Journal 'Studies in Photography' in 1996, where interviewed by Ray McKenzie (p.12). A copy of the journal is held in RSA Library (L.J.2016.0042).