Scott Heiser was born and raised in Wilmington, Delaware. He attended the Rhode Island School of Design (1967–1971), where his interest in art and design turned toward photography. Heiser studied with illustrator Richard Merkin and photographer Harry Callahan and blossomed in the school’s experimental atmosphere in the late 1960s. After graduation, he moved to New York City to pursue a career in fashion photography, eventually finding work as an assistant to Deborah Turbeville from 1973 through 1975, the critical years in which she developed her distinctive style.
Between 1972 and 1993, Heiser produced portraits, fashion photographs, and event pictures for a wide array of national magazines, including Interview, New York Magazine, Vogue, G.Q., Spin, and the Village Voice. He was a frequent contributor to downtown magazines, including the Soho Weekly News, New York Rocker, and Paper. He is best known for his innovative fashion runway photographs that appeared seasonally in Interview from 1978 through 1986. He was also an experienced portrait artist whose celebrity subjects included musicians Marianne Faithfull and Alberta Hunter, and artists Andy Warhol and Jamie Wyeth.
Heiser’s photographs were included in group exhibitions at the Hudson River Museum and the Grey Art Gallery. A selection of his fashion images were exhibited around the nation under the auspices of the French Cultural Services between 1985 and 1987, and in 1986 his work was featured in Next from New York 10 at the Tokyo Design Space–Axis. Heiser also exhibited his work in solo shows at the Midtown YMCA and at Paula Allen Gallery.
