John Baldessari was born in 1931 in National City, California, and today lives and works in Santa Monica, California. His art has been featured in more than 200 solo exhibitions in the United States and Europe and in over 750 group exhibitions. His projects include artist books, videos, films, billboards and public works. His awards include the Americans for the Arts lifetime achievement award, the Rolex Mentor and Protege Arts Initiative, the Governors Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Visual Arts in California, the Oscar Kokoschka Prize from Austria and the Spectrum-International Award for Photography of the Foundation of Lower Saxony, Germany. A forthcoming retrospective at the Tate Modern will open in London in 2009.