James Drake was born in Lubbock, Texas in 1946. He received his BFA in 1969 and MFA in 1970 from Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles, California. He currently lives and works in Santa Fe, New Mexico. His art has been displayed across the country, from the Whitney Museum of Art in New York City, New York to the National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, in Washington DC to the Art Museum of South Texas in Corpus Christi, Texas.