Bill Schenck (b. 1947) was born in Ohio and attended the Columbus College of Art and Design before earning a BFA from the Kansas City Art Intitute in 1969. He moved to New York City and initally was identified as a photo realist before evolving his flattened reductive style and themes which combined contemporary concerns with old west imagery. After early international success he relocated to Santa Fe and then Arizona where his images incorporated western landscape and cinematic characters.