Andrea Eckert was born in Kalamazoo, Michigan. She received her Bachelors of Fine Arts from Michigan State University in 2003, and her Master Fine Arts from Kendall College of Art and Design in 2008. During both her undergraduate and graduate studies, she investigated the relationships between reality and simulated reality.
These interests in the idea of simulacra lead her to consider the duality of found objects juxtaposed with a rendering of an object within a two-dimensional context. Her presentation of both the 2-D translation alongside the object itself, offers the viewer an opportunity to experience the concept of actuality verses facsimile.
For Eckert, employing the found object proposes a certain truth in nature. The objects hold substance, are operational, and has memory, while the simulation becomes hyper-real, a removal. Her representational imagery boasts the artificial and has facility to submerge truths.
Eckert exhibits regionally and nationally and is a fervent educator and mother. She lives in the Detroit area with her husband, two children, dog, cat, and chickens.