Sanford Fisher was born on the Gordon First Nation, near Punnichy in southeast Saskatchewan, in 1927.

Entirely self-taught, Fisher was a popular and prolific prairie artist, often painting scenes from his early life on the reserve and its surrounding landscape, long after he himself had relocated to Regina, Saskatchewan.

Shortly after establishing his career as an artist, Fisher has his painting arm amputated as the result of an accident. To provide for his family, while still recovering in hospital, he began painting with his other arm and soon was able to achieve the same popular realist style of his previous work. Favorite subjects included family life, farming and hunting on the reserve, and the prairie landscape.

Sanford Fisher died in 1988, in Regina.