Chris Barnickel is an artist from Point Pleasant, New Jersey, born in 1982. He received a BFA in Illustration and an MFA in Drawing and Painting from Laguna College of Art and Design. Chris studied portrait painting in Italy as part of his MFA thesis work.
He has lived and painted in different locations across the East and West Coasts, including New Jersey, Portland, Los Angeles, and Huntington Beach, CA, and periodically exhibits his work locally.
In 2012, Chris co-founded B-Studio in Santa Ana, CA, a gallery and studio space for emerging artists from Southern CA, where he worked as a director and curator until 2016.
Chris finds inspiration in the natural environment around him, especially the coast. He creates surrealist landscape paintings that explore the impact of human development on the environment, conveying both beauty and destruction.