A native Washingtonian, Baer is a graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design, where he studied Industrial Design and would later gravitate toward painting and fine art. Baer uses foundational design elements (line, gesture, negative space, color field) as tools for artistic composition and spatial relationships. His work is influenced by and builds from the foundation of the mid-century US modernists. Baer also works in glass, prints and digital art, some of which deal with the subject matter of the everyday placed out of context. His work is found in corporate and private collections in the US and Europe.