Sandy Skoglund

Sandy Skoglund was born in Weymouth, Massachusetts (USA) in 1946. She studied studio art and art history at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts from 1964 – 68. Skoglund went to graduate school at the University of Iowa in 1969 where she studied filmmaking, intaglio printmaking, and multimedia art, receiving her M.A. in 1971 and her M.F.A. in painting in 1972. She moved to New York City in 1972, where she started working as a conceptual artist, dealing with repetitive, process-oriented art production through the techniques of mark making and photocopying. In the late 1970s Skoglund’s desire to document conceptual ideas led her to teach herself photography. This resulted in the kind of “staged photography” that other artists became involved with starting in the 1980s such as Cindy Sherman and David LaChapelle. This was a larger result of an interest in popular culture and commercial picture making strategies, resulting in the directorial tableau work Skoglund is known for today.