Aleksander Balos was born in 1970 in the town of Gliwice, Poland. His parents, Jan and Janina, were artists, who encouraged him to study art in Gliwice Art Center, while he was still in elementary school. He did his first painting lessons with his father’s oil paints. In 1989 he went to the United States to attend St Joseph High School in Kenosha, Wisconsin. There he met with an artist, and his high school art teacher, Kathy Gagliardi, who encouraged him to attend an art school.
Balos received a full scholarship to Cardinal Stritch University in Milwaukee WI, where he studied painting and drawing with Philosophy Professor Garry Rosine. After completing his BFA, and having his first museum show at The Charles Allis Art Museum in 1995 Balos relocated to Chicago to study in the atelier program at the School of Representational Art with Bruno Surdo and Mike Chelich, where he studied drawing and painting of the human form. In 1998, he exhibited his triptych Last Supper at Ann Nathan Gallery in Chicago. Figurative realism and portraiture constituted most of the body of Balos' work in the '90s and early 2000s. During that time, Balos returned frequently to Europe to research painting techniques and contents of the old masters' paintings. Balos' work utilizes human figure to portray various ideals and faults of human existence without suggesting solutions. The narrative compositions are intended to be interpreted by the audience, as only then the paintings gain their temporary and subjective meaning. In addition, in Chicago, Balos became an American citizen.
Since 1997 Balos has been represented by the Ann Nathan Gallery in Chicago, where he has held five solo exhibitions. Since 2000 Balos has contributed work to art gallery shows in New York, Atlanta, Chicago, Paris, Utrecht and Barcelona; and for art fairs such as The Armory Show in NY, Art Chicago, Palm Beach3, WWK Biennale in Munich, and the Royal Academy's Summer Show in London.
In 2005 Balos relocated to Northern California and since then his body of work has expanded to include looser applications, utilizing abstractions and multi-media techniques and styles. Balos is also teaching drawing and painting privately at his atelier named ArtRoster in California, where they hold Annual Forgery Shows on April 1 of each year.
Solo exhibitions
2012 - Paintings, Stock in Art Gallery, Mt.Shasta, CA
2011 - New Paintings, Red Door Gallery, Mt.Shasta, CA
2005 - Palm Beach 3, Palm Beach, California Palm Beach, CA
2005 - Form and Substance, Agora Gallery, New York, NY
2004 - Art Chicago, Navy Pier, Chicago, IL
2003 - Art Chicago, Navy Pier, Chicago, IL
2003 - Armory, New York, N.Y
2002 - Art Chicago, Navy Pier, Chicago, IL
2002 - Young Painters, Miami University, Oxford, OH
1999 - The Figure Studied : An Examination of the Historical and Contemporary Perspective on the Human Form, Crossman Gallery, University of Wisconsin, WI
1999 - The Chicago Art Scene, Belloc Lowndes Gallery, Chicago, IL
1998 - Paintings, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL
1995 - Paintings of Figures, August House Studio, Chicago, IL
1995 - Elevations, Layton Gallery, Milwaukee, WI
1995 - Paintings, David Barnett Gallery/Rice Building, Milwaukee, WI
1995 - Annual Spring Show, League of Milwaukee Artists, The Charles Allis Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI
1991 - Annual Juried Show, 234 Gallery, Kenosha, WI
Distinctions
Florence Biennale Invited to Florence Biennale 2007
Forbes Trinchera Residency co-sponsored by American Artist magazine
Publications
Metamorphosis 2, 2008
Direct Art Magazine, #13, NY, article Fall 2006
The Departed, Martin Scorsese, 2005
Who's Who in International Professionals, 2004
Miroir de l’Art, Number 4, Paris, 2004
NY Arts Magazine, his philosophy on art 2002
G. Jurek Polanski, Parables, Artscopes.net, April 2001
ArtNet, dealers selling his art his dealers 2000
New American Paintings, Juried Exhibition in Print, Number 29, Open Studio Press, 2000
G. Jurek Polanski, Mystical Realism of Eastern and Western Spirituality, Arscope.net, November 1999
The Chicago Art Scene: Sixty-eight Contemporary Artists, Crow Woods Publishing, 1998
