About

From the White House, Cofounding a Space Tech Company, to Joining the Infantry…

Before becoming an artist, Sean Abram Barela built a career spanning the White House, the Pentagon, and the frontiers of the commercial space industry. He went on to lobby for emerging technologies including private international space stations and small modular nuclear reactors before becoming a space technology entrepreneur, co-founding a company focused on space weather and the radiation environment beyond Earth. After exiting the company, Sean chose a dramatically different path—joining the U.S. Army and serving as an Infantry Officer.

Art entered his life unexpectedly. After developing seizures and ultimately being diagnosed with epilepsy, Sean turned to painting during a period that fundamentally changed the course of his life. What began as a creative outlet became a new way to translate his experiences, ideas, and imagination onto canvas.

Today, his work draws from the worlds he has experienced firsthand—government, military service, technology, and space—while exploring the intersection of nostalgia, imagination, and the future. His unconventional path continues to shape an equally unconventional body of work.