Today we’d like to introduce you to Stevan Collins Lazich.
Hi Stevan, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
I began doing visual art and interior decorating after being immersed in it growing up. My mother Callie Ellis was a a French Antique Furniture importer, and interior decorator and ran a drapery workroom my whole life here in Memphis, We had customers that covered Mississippi, Arkansas, Louisiana, and Tennessee.
I did furniture restoration and art conservation after she passed in 1990 along with my family from Southern California, they relocated here to Memphis in 1992. So they added to their interior design and drapery workroom business with my mom’s legacy of fine French Antique furniture. I worked for 10 years for Brice Antiques & Interiors I left the family business to pursue my career which included full-time DJ, VIP host, restaurant management, bartending, live music promotion, and bookings over the next 20 years.
All through these 20 years my artistic talents were interwoven throughout everything I did. Helping on design projects for a list of family, friends, and restaurants/venues my design eye was always prevalent. I left the restaurant business after my health took a turn post-Covid era. I couldn’t work the 12-14 hour shifts I had been doing 6–8 shifts a week. (DJing 8 gigs a week, twice on Sunday in the Dish, Beauty Shop, and Mollie Fontaine days).
To make bills I started printing graphic images I curated and designed onto fabric (always in love with textiles from growing up around them) and building wood stretcher frames to wrap this printed fabric image around. They started as extra large art for my patio as they could hang outside. I started making and selling these pieces to locals, as you can’t ship anything over 24×24 inches that doesn’t cost a fortune. My pieces are usually in the 40×60 size range but I do pieces that are 60×90.
When I was fighting MRSA/staph infections alongside my lifelong Psoriasis and Psoriatic Arthritis I had to find a way to keep income coming in but I couldn’t stand up working 8-hour days. For 2 months, I was completely unable to walk or get out of bed. I had gone septic and was on my way out. I fought to walk again and was on my feet to walk into my best friend’s funeral on April 1, no joke. Shea Grauer was murdered here in Memphis and there still is no justice for his killer. I was a 15-year-old orphan and Shea was my closest family (“my brother”) through all these years.
Through everything I started producing works of art and people have huge interest from everyone around me. My designs and work are inspired by 19th-century-style French wallpapers and murals to 50, 60s, and 70s Memphis Rhythm and Blues, Soul, and Rock n Roll. My eye is everything I have digested in the years I have lived and worked around antiques, music, culture but mostly the people of Memphis. I am doing more consulting on interiors as well these days. From hanging art to doing full home color palettes and decorating.
My daily routine is to get up and keep walking, head to my studio work on visual art, and spend evenings helping with design work on clients and friends. But I do it all here in Memphis just like my mother did for so many years here. In Central Gardens, Midtown Memphis Tennessee.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Born in Carroll County, Mississippi (hill country), I was orphaned by age 15. Mother, father, brother, stepfather, and the list has kept going nonstop Grew up here in Memphis with only 2 people to ever fall back on. My best friends Shea Grauer (murdered February 2023) and Debbie Hannah of NYC.
Never could afford to train formally in the art of any kind through school after Bill Hicks Central High. He taught me photography and printmaking outside of school and it’s the curriculum. He helped refine my composition. My cousin Alanna Brice I worked with for 10 years, helped me refine my color and scale. So I was missing an art degree like everyone successful in art around me.
I was taught by a real-life Renaissance woman, my mother, Callie Ellis. She said, “Son you better learn to master it the first time because to survive you need to get paid for it the next time.”
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
Primarily as a visual artist, I am known for Large wall art. My process is Giclee printing on fabric which is stretched like canvas around a wood stretcher frame. Giclee printing is what fine art reproduction prints are using on canvas and paper.
It’s inkjet printing on a synthetic faux silk fabric. The fabric is semi-translucent so it can be backlit or hung over a light source or window. After I design the graphic image and prepare it I send it off to a printer. When I get the piece back I custom cut a stretcher frame from 2×2 lumber. After the frame is Hand pieced together the fabric image then gets stretched and stapled to the frame just like you would when stretching a canvas for a painting. Picture hanging straps and wire are applied to the back.
I have begun to “overpaint” the printed image with fabric stain and acrylic fabric paint. I prefer the fabric stain as it keeps with the semi-translucent properties of the printed image.
Before we let you go, we’ve got to ask if you have any advice for those who are just starting.
Do your homework before you purchase art supplies.
Too expensive to make mistakes early in the game. But if you have supplies available then research the multitude of uses that product has. Reading directions can save you time and money. Hahahaha.
Learn something every day in everything you do. Keen sense educates as much as doing research.
Pricing:
- $150-650 per piece
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/tallslimcollins_design?igshid=YTQwZjQ0NmI0OA%3D%3D&utm_source=qr
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/profile/776049185/?ref=permalink&mibextid=6ojiHh
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevan-lazich-2572191a7?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=ios_app
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@stevanlazich7932
- SoundCloud: https://on.soundcloud.com/A6X57JjFqeEsEZMS7
Image Credits
Debbie Hannah and Stevan Lazich
