C. D. Dickerson joined the National Gallery in 2015 as curator and head of the department of sculpture and decorative arts. In 2022 he became senior curator of European and American art. Prior to the National Gallery, he spent eight years at the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth as curator of European art. Among the exhibition he curated there are From the Private Collections of Texas: European Art, Ancient to Modern (2009–2010); Bernini: Sculpting in Clay (2012–2013); The Brothers Le Nain: Painters of Seventeenth-Century France (2016–2017); and Casanova: The Seduction of Europe (2017).

While leading the department of sculpture and decorative arts at the National Gallery, he has been responsible for several key acquisitions, including Luisa Roldán’s Virgin and Child, David d’Anger’s Comte Antoine Boulay de la Meurthe, an important seventeenth-century northern European nautilus cup, and one of the rare poem jars by the enslaved African American potter David Drake. His first exhibition at the National Gallery was Alonso Berruguete: First Sculptor of Renaissance Spain (2019), which won the prize for the best book in Spanish art history for 2019. His next exhibition, opening in June 2023, focuses on the brilliantly expressive terracotta models of the sculptor Antonio Canova.

Dickerson received his Ph.D. from the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, and bachelor’s degree from Princeton University.