Christopher Balder was born in Hudson, NY in 1967. He grew up on the East coast and attended Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY, studying to be a classical pianist. After moving to the West coast in 1990, his emphasis shifted to the visual arts, and he currently maintains a studio in Seattle, WA. While primarily self-taught, he has studied printmaking at Pratt Fine Arts Center in Seattle.
Working in nonrepresentational or abstract imagery, Christopher finds excitement and inspiration in the spontaneous manipulation of the medium in which form, line and color interact and evolve organically. When incorporating recognizable imagery, he strives to maintain this same spontaneity. Not being very process oriented, he prefers the immediacy of working in acrylic paint, and often mixes paint, charcoal, graphite, oil pastel, collage and monotype. While he finds the process of making art to be one of introspection and self-discovery, he prefers to leave the final interpretation to the viewer.
Christopher has been in solo and group shows in Washington, Oregon and California. His work is found in private collections in the Pacific Northwest, New York, New England and Australia.
