Jack Goldstein grew up in Los Angeles and studied at Chouinard Art Institute and later at the California Institute of the Arts, where he notably studied under John Baldessari. Graduating in 1972, he belonged to the first generation of CalArts students and became an important figure in the neo-avant-garde movements of the 1970s and 1980s associated with the Pictures Generation, simulationism, and Neo-Geo. His practice began with performance and sculpture before turning to film, sound, and painting. After settling in New York City in 1974, he developed a body of work centered on images and media. During the 1980s, his paintings achieved significant success. Inspired by media and photographic imagery - bombings, lightning strikes, fireworks, and cosmic phenomena - they were often created with airbrush techniques and assistants in order to erase the trace of the artist’s hand. Influenced by minimal and conceptual art, this method questioned the perception of images and the role of ,technology in representing phenomena invisible to the naked eye. His series, grouped around the “spectacles of war,” nature, and technology, combined a spectacular aesthetic with reflections on the destruction and construction of contemporary images.