A native of California, James Swinnerton grew up in the Santa Clara valley. He began his studies at the San Francisco Art Association Art School at the age of 16. During the 1890s, he earned a good living working as a cartoonist for William Randolph Hearst.

The artist suffered from Tuberculosis and relocated for a time to Colton, California to recuperate. He then began to focus on paintings of the desert, a subject for which he is best known today.