T.ro is an outsider artist from Alabama who now lives in Washington DC. He has never received any formal art training. He is on permanent display at an Alabama charity alongside such famous folk artists as Mose T and Howard Finster, has been included in the rotating folk art show folk art of the south in Birmingham and recently has been selling at the famed Eastern Market in Washington DC. His work is owned by people living in nearly every state of the USA.

T.ro paints scenes, people and ideas from memory and tries to paint them onto whatever he has available. Sometimes the painting looks like the picture that was in his head and sometimes it does not, but he always loves trying. This obsessive painting began with a piece of found wood and some leftover latex paint from painting the house. T.ro and his roommate RUFAS collaborated on their first ever painting, and painted at the same table together for the next year.

Since that time, T.ro has begun to use acrylics, as well as continued use of latex. Recently he has focused on sculptures, delicate wire and glass creations that are constantly changing and moving. T.ro frequently mixes written words, slogans, and miscellaneous sayings into his art. He also commonly will make a painting that consists only of some thought or statement that he heard and that struck him as true.

T.ro has expanded his artistic range to include sculpture made from books, bent rod, wire, glass, and other found or unusual objects. T.ro has found inspiration and influence from the many famous self-taught Artists that the south has to offer. Having made visits with Mose T, Woodie Long, and Howard Finster, he has been influenced by their styles as well as through the objects he uses in his creations. T.ro has developed his own style; consisting often of bold primary colors, abstracted or partial depictions of people, with written words included in almost all of his artworks.

T.ro has been shown in several local galleries around Alabama, as well as in Florida and North Carolina. He has sold over 700 paintings since he began, as well as numerous book pieces and sculptures.

Thoreau Bartmann is 29 years old and 17 feet tall.