Robert Heinecken

Robert Heinecken was an American artist best known for his innovative work in photography, sculpture, and installation art. He was born in Denver, Colorado, and grew up in Riverside, California.

Heinecken served in the U.S. Marine Corps during the Korean War, and after his service, he attended Los Angeles City College and the University of California, Los Angeles, where he studied printmaking, sculpture, and photography.

Heinecken's work challenged the traditional boundaries of photography and explored the medium's relationship to mass media, consumer culture, and politics. He often used found images from magazines, advertisements, and television broadcasts to create collages, photograms, and other forms of visual art.

In the 1960s, Heinecken founded the photography department at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he taught until his retirement in 1991. He also co-founded the Society for Photographic Education and served as its president from 1974 to 1975.

Heinecken's work is held in many public and private collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. He died in 2006 in Albuquerque, New Mexico.