Born into a conservative Christian family, son of a preacher, Rickard barely managed to graduate high school. After a five-year hiatus, he attended the University of California, San Diego, studied history, and graduated in 1994 with a sense of purpose. Set in perennial opposition to his father’s dogma, Rickard was drawn to underserviced, poor, neglected, and otherwise marginalized American neighborhoods. He started two websites, American Suburb X and These Americans (NSFW), that pick up where Walker Evans and Diane Arbus left off—they are a collection of remarkable essays and images, archival and contemporary, that reflects on an America not captured in the mainstream media. Indeed, Rickard’s most famous show, A New American Picture, explores an America that is perpetually visual and always hidden.