Tammi 'La Ree' Byrum is a self-taught artist raised on the sunny beaches of San Diego, California. She is a business owner, wife to a fellow artist, mother to a young son and owner of one very spoiled blue cattle dog! When she is not taking care of her young family, whipping up vegan deliciousness and taking care of business she can be found up all hours of the night in her little office/studio creating art for visual pleasure and commentary.
Her style focuses on mixed media collages, assemblages and oil paintings. She has tried her hand with all sorts of art mediums and so it was only a natural gravitation towards mixed media. She became fascinated with textures and shading when she took several mixed media courses in college. After placing 2nd in mixed media for one of the art exhibitions produced by the Kruglak Gallery at the local MiraCosta Community College in 2006 she was spurred onward in this direction. Some major artists or genres that have inspired her in some fashion or another would be Georges Barque, Toulouse-Lautrec, Man Ray, Dada, Marcel Duchamp, Stieglitz, Bauhaus, Diego Rivera, Charles Bukowski, Aldous Huxley, Herman Melville and Walt Whitman to name a few.'
From the moment she could pick up a crayon as a little child she never stopped drawing and conceptualizing quality artwork well beyond her years. When asked about her relationship with art she reminisces...
'I was always lost in my art and it is definitely a part of my intrinsic fiber. It is not unheard of to see me incessantly drawing and erasing the same lines over and over till I depicted perfectly what was flowing forth from my mind. I think there is a certain genius coupled with a sort of madness that is common place when you're an artist. Almost like being meticulous and obsessive are key criteria! A work of art is not just part of 'playtime' but an extension of the artist as well as the buyer. We (the buyer and I ) connect with each other but also are entitled to our own interpretations of what the art has to say.'
'There have been some members of my family who have heavily influenced my style and how I approach art. Bless my mom who never stopped believing in my talent even when I chose to put it on the shelf for almost a decade. I believe I was passed this gift down from my father and also my maternal grandfather. I will explain briefly what each man taught me about art in two very different but necessary ways.
'When I was around 5 or so I found my father's love journals to my mother when he was overseas. He would write love letters to her but would draw these beautiful flower blossoms on each page as a colorful watermark. I was engrossed and each page was a new visual treat. I could feel his love for her 'blooming' through each of those writings. I forever equated art with expressing and giving love. What an introduction!'
'Unfortunately my amazingly talented grandpa taught me that you can be a great artist and still have a hard living. The starving artist was a very real analogy for me. He and I never spoke of what his paintings meant to him personally but I would study them for hours. I think it was my way of critiquing them before I even knew there was a method to it. He did not have the resources we have now such as social media and the internet but still I saw what it was like to be a struggling artist twenty years ago. Art was in fact in my blood and after many years of running away from it I finally gave in. My life has been the better for it and I hope to make the world a better place for it as well. '
Thank you and enjoy,
La Ree
Tammi Byrum joined Pixels.com Licensing on June 25th, 2014.
