Robert Berardi was born in 1968 and grew up in Mahopac, NY. In 1988, the UArts sophomore ran out into a hurricane and began sketching a new character that would become his life's work. He moved to Brooklyn in early 1992 and was part of the first-wave Williamsburg scene. He worked odd jobs in Soho galleries and showed paintings of "Desiree" at Salmagundi. In 2007, Berardi started teaching Art at a South Bronx high school. He moved to the Bronx (Belmont, where his maternal grandparents grew up) in 2013. He returned to fine art in 2015. In 2021, inspiration struck on a night he had no brush; he began fingerpainting. In a defiant stance against AI, all Berardi's works since then have been entirely fingerpainted. In 2023, Berardi and former student Nicholas Dwamena (AKA Kofi) formed the Gun Hill Six, a Bronx art collective known for DIY gallery events.
