Some of the first artists to create what came to be known as lowbrow art were underground cartoonists like Robert Williams and Gary Panter.

Barry McGee, Margaret Kilgallen, Dan "Plasma" Rauch and Camilla Elke were amongst the first to pioneer Lowbrow as a street art, zine, fashion, graffiti, and counter culture movement.

The Bess Cutler Gallery also went on to show important artists and helped expand the kind of art that was classified as lowbrow.

[8] In an article in the February 2006 issue of his magazine Juxtapoz, Robert Williams took credit for originating the term "lowbrow art".

He stated that in 1979 Gilbert Shelton of the publisher Rip Off Press decided to produce a book featuring Willams' paintings.