Cover Artist: Jaime Byrd

Notice to readers: Jamie’s gallery was completely destroyed during Hurricane Helene, and a GoFundMe account has been set up to help her during recovery. You can donate here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/rebuild-jaime-byrds-art-gallery-after-storm

By Gina Malone

Some artists traverse many creative paths throughout their lifetimes. Jaime Byrd is one of them. Her father is an artist and retired art teacher, and home in southern California was a creative place while she was growing up there—and a place, too, where she was able to enjoy backpacking and camping on beaches and in the mountains. “Spending time outdoors and living in beautiful places then became a priority for me,” Byrd says. In college she studied music and fine arts, and spent much of her 20s and 30s working on and off as a musician. She was, she says, “striving for that quintessential record deal that never came.” Along with Adam Cohen, her husband and business partner, she started a jewelry design business in Oregon. “During the jewelry business period, I decided to follow another passion of mine: filmmaking,” Byrd says. “By putting myself through film school and eventually starting a small production company, this new career took me and Adam around the globe for over 10 years.”

In 1999, she took classes in painting, another long-time love, but it wasn’t until 2018 that she began to think about painting full-time. “I had always had the plan in the back of my mind to retire from film and move into painting, but I just didn’t know when that would be,” she says. “As fate would have it, the pandemic played a huge role in moving me into this direction and decision. Since I wasn’t traveling to work on film projects any longer, I decided to absorb myself completely into painting.”

Her style has evolved through the years into working with oil paint on wood panels and often mixing other mediums into the work for layering. “I will often dig back into the surface to reveal history and layers from early on in the painting,” she says. “I also will use power tools on the surface to create more texture and markings because who doesn’t like power tools?”

The pandemic fostered a merging of her filmmaking with painting so that her paintings, in a process called augmented reality (AR), come to life with motion and sound. “Once the painting is complete, I evaluate whether I want to create a film that will tell a deeper story,” Byrd says. “Not only am I using footage, effects and animation I’ve captured or created myself as a film editor but I’m building an emotional short story that takes the viewer further into my painting. Normally, I would have these films playing on a projector in my gallery, but since technology now allows us to view these movies with a mobile phone, one can have a personal interactive experience with these pieces of artwork. The movies are created to make it appear as if the painting is coming to life, but, in fact, it is just a film I’ve created that is playing over the painting.”

Fellow artist Lynn Stanley has watched Byrd’s work evolve over several years. “Like her works themselves, her inspiration is not static, but constantly innovating and exploring new paths of artistic expression,” she says. “Her art is an adventure. The vivid colors attract you, the composition intrigues you, and then, wow! The sound and motion just blow you away!”

Throughout October, Byrd will have a special exhibition in her 2,000-square-foot gallery of some of her newest paintings. On Fridays through Sundays, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day, there will be wine as well as special mezcal tastings.

Learn more at JaimeByrd.com and follow on Instagram @jaimebyrd. Jaime Byrd Contemporary Art Gallery is located at 375 Depot Street, Suite 105, in Asheville’s River Arts District. Hours are 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Byrd is not in the gallery every day, so appointments are recommended for those wishing to discuss art needs with her.