Raymond Pettibon was born in Tucson, Arizona, in 1957. As an undergraduate at the University of California, Los Angeles, Pettibon studied economics but soon after graduating, decided to become a professional artist. In his early career, Pettibon was a member of the California punk rock scene, producing illustrations and graphic work for bands and magazines. Over time, his artistic practice evolved, with drawing as his primary discipline. In his drawings and animated works, Pettibon combines language and visual imagery in an ambiguously suggestive manner, as if recording remnants of narratives and half-formed thoughts.

Solo exhibitions of his work have been shown at the Philadelphia Museum of Art; the Whitney Museum of American Art; and the Kestner Gesellschaft in Hannover, Germany. Pettibon also participated in Documenta XI in 2002.