Born in Germany, Zimmerman’s family moved to Schenectady, New York, when he was four years old. After serving in the United States Army in both World War II and the Korean War, Zimmerman attended Hudson Valley Technical Institute, graduating with a degree in electrical technology.

While working for General Electric in Germany, he had an emotional breakdown and was hospitalized. Flashbacks of bombing his own hometown in Germany during the war haunted him. Upon returning to the United States, he was assigned to the Cape Canaveral Moon Project, but after a second breakdown he quit his job and began to make art fulltime.

Zimmerman says, “My work is a direct expression of entities in contact with me from different dimensions. By bringing them into this world through my art, I hope to make viewers aware of the greater dimensionality of life – a view very different from the ‘normal’ day-to-day reality we perceive.”