American artist whose work in altered and adjusted photographic imagery and video were central to the development of conceptual art in the United States.

Baldessari received a B.A. at San Diego State College in 1953 and attended the University of California at Berkeley and at Los Angeles before receiving a master's degree from San Diego State College in 1957. Originally intending to be an art critic, he became a central figure in the growth of Los Angeles as a major art centre. Baldessari taught at the California Institute of the Visual Arts (CalArts) in Valencia from 1970 to 1990. Thereafter he joined the art faculty of the University of California, Los Angeles.

Initially Baldessari worked with what has been called the “phototext canvas,” words painted on a canvas. His interest in language-based art led him to create a great variety of works, all in some combination of words, still images, and video. In the 1970s he made several deadpan but absurd videos, including, for example, one in which he “sings” several sentences by conceptual artist Sol LeWitt regarding art and another in which he “teaches a plant the alphabet.” He is perhaps best known for his works juxtaposing found photographs such as film stills, taking them out of their original context and rearranging their articulation, and often including words or bits of sentences. His examination of the ambiguities and frailties of photographic communication exposed the range of ways in which photographic images could be organized and “read.” His work both undercuts and reinforces the procedures of perception.