Born in Glasgow, George Devlin studied at Glasgow School of Art from1955 to1960 during which time he won a number of major art awards including the Haldane Scholarship, Chalmers Prize and Carnegie Travelling Scholarship. He continued his studies while painting and travelling in Italy and Greece, later crossing the Sahara and living in West Africa.

His work is held in the permanent collections of HM The Queen, the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, the Fleming Collection, the London Stock Exchange, Prudential plc, De Beers, Aberdeen Art Gallery, Edinburgh City Collection, Teachers Whisky, Bank of Scotland, Clydesdale Bank, The Royal Bank of Scotland, and Aberdeen Asset Management amongst many others.