Guy Coheleach grew up at Baldwin, Long Island and began sketching and drawing as a child. He attended Bishop Loughlin High School (Brooklyn, N.Y) and later won a scholarship to Cooper Union School of Art in New York City. He would later still receive an honorary Doctor of Arts from the College of William and Mary (Williamsburg, VA). He began his career as a commercial artist, but when two of his animal paintings were accepted by the National Wildlife Federation for conservation stamps, he realized he could make a living painting wildlife. He made his first trip to Africa in 1966 and to which place he has continued to return. Coheleach has also visited the National Parks of the United States and traveled to Europe and South America. Coheleach has received the Society of Animal Artists' Award of Excellence eight times and their Lifetime Achievement Award. He also received the Master Artist Medal from the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum (Wausau, WI) and an award for Duck Stamp Design for Ducks Unlimited. Coheleach has been immortalized in several films: Journeys of an Artist; Guy Coheleach and the Bald Eagle; and Quest: An Artist and His Prey. His "bigs cats" are the subject of The Big Cats: The Paintings of Guy Coheleach (1986) by paleontologist and zoologist, Nancy Neff; and Guy Coheleach's Animal Art (Wieland, 1994). Coheleach wrote and illustrated The African Lion as Man-Eater (2004). He is a member of the American Federation of Arts; Artists of America; and Society of Animal Artists and has exhibited at the Artists of America Denver Rotary Club; National Academy of Western Art; and Society of Animal Artists. His art has also been exhibited at the Royal Ontario Museum; Corcoran Gallery (Washington D.C.); the Norton Gallery; and the Newark Museum (NJ).