Najee Strickland is a multidisciplinary artist born and raised in Memphis, TN and resides in Oakland, CA. Art has always been apart of Najee's life, from his moms colorful and bold interior design to his dads custom clothing designs. He started out drawing colorful stick figures at the age of six. While being inspired by cartoon networks like ‘Nickelodeon’ and newspaper comic strips in the ‘Commercial Appeal’, his art and skills escalated by the age of thirteen. Practicing with different medias such as: oil & chalk pastel, acrylic, and oil based paints; his style of art transitioned by the ages of fourteen through seventeen by simply drawing and painting detailed images of people. At the age of eighteen, Najee enrolled into Southwest Tennessee Community College where he majored in Architecture/ Engineering Technology. By his third year of community college he knew architecture/engineering was not his calling so he dropped out and joined the Memphis Fire Department to get more time off to work on his visuals. Now, he is a full time creative and he wouldn't change it for the world. Every little bit of knowledge helps. Putting the knowledge of past jobs, college, and skill set changed his visuals to painting and constructing them in creative and different ways. Along with venturing out and experimenting with film and photography.

"You have to be innovative and inspire the world all at the same time. Art is like a different reality, but with subliminal truths."

Images provided by Andrew of Ejji Studios