Charles Laurens (Larry) Heald was born December 26, 1940 in Port Huron, Michigan. He graduated from Port Huron High School in 1958. After two years at Albion College in Michigan, Heald transferred to the University of Washington, Seattle, in 1960, where he received a BA (cum laude) in 1963, an MFA in painting in 1964 and was the recipient of a National Scholarship Award to study at the Yale University Summer School of Music and Art in 1962. During this time he entered numerous competitive shows, and began having solo shows in Seattle galleries as well as a solo show at the State Capitol Museum, Olympia, in 1964.

Heald taught at Pennsylvania State University in 1965-66, then moved to the Bay Area of northern California and began painting full time. He continued to exhibit in Seattle, and was included in "Art Across America" (1965) and the "85th Annual" (1966) San Francisco Museum of Art. In 1968 Heald's work was included in the "Contemporary Landscape Show", originating at the San Francisco Art Institute and traveling nationally. In 1969 his work was featured at Allen Stone Gallery's "New Faces", NYC. and the "Wellington-Ivest Collection", Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and in 1970, was included in the show accompanying the introduction of John Lennon's prints at the Lee Nordness Gallery, NYC.

Heald moved to the Skagit Valley in Washington in 1970 and began his long run of solo shows at the Manolides Gallery, Seattle. During the next four years he was included in the "Governor's Invitational", State Museum, Olympia, "American Landscape", University of Washington, "Prospect Northwest" and "Skagit Valley Artists" , Seattle Art Museum. Heald was given a solo exhibit at Portland State University in 1974. He taught briefly at Western Washington University, Bellingham, and was co-director of Fidalgo Art Institute, LaConner with the late sculptor, Lawrence Beck. Heald returned to California in 1974, and continued to show primarily in the Seattle area, but also exhibited in New York, Chicago, San Fransisco and many places between. He was given a retrospective at the University of Puget Sound, Tacoma, in 1983, and exhibited with the original "Skagit Valley Artists" at the Museum of Northwest Art, LaConner, Washington, in 1992.

After living in Northern California for thirty years, Heald returned to Washington with his wife, Dana, and daughter, Sierra, and is now living on Skagit Bay of Puget Sound.