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Early Life and Family
On January 24, 1921, Patrick Scott (born Percy Smyth Scott) was born in Kilbrittain, County Cork. His mother, Eileen, was the daughter of a Bank of Ireland agent, and his father, Percy Smyth Scott, was a farmer. Born on March 17, St. Patrick's Day, he was known by his nickname Pat from the beginning. Of the four children, he was the youngest (two girls and two boys). He was kept at home during his boyhood due to a prolonged bout of chronic gastritis, an inflammation of the stomach lining, while the elder kids were sent to school.

He grew up on the family's several hundred-acre farm in Kilbrittain until he was twelve years old. He was subsequently transferred to Monkstown Park Preparatory School in 1933 and St. Columba's senior school in Whitechurch, County Dublin, in September 1935. The school did not teach art, but a forward-thinking instructor set up a studio for the lads who wished to study it, where Scott started painting what he called “imaginary landscapes”.

His intentions to become an architect in London after school were derailed when war broke out. Remaining in Dublin, he enrolled at UCD to study architecture (1939–44). During his tenure at UCD, The chief professor of the small architecture department, R. M. Butler, had died in 1943 after a long illness, and until the penultimate year of Scott's tenure, no new professor had been appointed, leaving the department in disorder.

Scott was involved in both theatrical and artistic circles while attending university, both of which were energised by the presence of pacifist expatriate artists from continental Europe and London during the war years. The avant-garde White Stag group had a big influence on his early paintings. Members of the group supported "subjective art," which promoted artistic experimentation and self-expression. November 1944 saw Scott's debut solo exhibition at Lower Baggot Street's White Stag Gallery.