Andrea Gardner was born in California and completed her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree at the University of California at Santa Cruz and a master of Fine Arts in painting from the University of Iowa.
She has lived in numerous places including Montana, New York City, Rome, Italy and since 1995 has lived in Wanganui.
While in New York City she worked primarily with hair as a sculptural and drawing material. Prior to working with meat trays, found objects and digital photography, as featured in Lop-Sided into Paradise, she made large scale charcoal drawings and marker drawings on roller blinds as well as terracotta clay sculpture and wool cut-outs on hanging blankets.
Andrea shows regularly and her work is held in the collections of the Sarjeant Gallery, the Dowse and Te Papa.