Jim Schwartz was born in California in 1944 and spent his formative years in Central California drawing, painting and carving. He was part of the San Francisco Bay area art movement in the 1960s, contributing drawings to underground newspapers, working on light shows, painting acrylic hard-edge abstracts and creating poster art. Schwartz landed at Expo 67 in Montreal, Canada and enrolled in the Montreal Museum of Fine Art under Dean Arthur Lismer. As an artist, he was involved in the underground newspaper business and spent much of his time at the museum school drawing. Schwartz then moved west to Vancouver, Canada briefly working for the Georgia Straight before settling in Sechelt to start a family, build a house, garden, and Studio #1. He was involved in various types of employment and started carving local stone while in Sechelt. He received a Canada Council bursary for his stone carving work in 1969. While still living in Sechelt, Schwartz worked in the fishing industry in Tofino, on Vancouver Island. During the off-season, he worked at silversmithing, lost wax casting, painting, as well as carving ivory, stone, and wax. By 1976, Schwartz had moved to Tofino, built Studio #2, and started enameling on cast silver and copper. While in Tofino, he acquired welding skills and built welded sculpture pieces using steel and aluminum, in addition to working as a marine fabricator welder, boilermaker welder, and shipyard pipefitter. In 1984, Schwartz attended the Sculptors Institute at Capilano College in North Vancouver to learn ceramic shell casting for bronze under sculptor David Marshall. While in residence, he experimented with enamelling on bronze. In 1989, Schwartz moved to Studio #3 to focus on carving marble and casting and enameling in bronze. During the 1990s, Schwartz worked in various studios in Pietrasanta, Italy, where he carved marble sculptures and absorbed the history of sculptural knowledge of the town. Between 1996 and 2005, he carved yule marble seasonally in Marble, Colorado and participated in various other marble carving symposiums. In 2005, he relocated to Studio #4 in the industrial area of Tofino. Currently, Schwartz works from his Tofino home studio and is involved in 3D scanning clay maquettes and casting bronzes based on various themes.