Oleg Stavrowsky

1927 - 2020

Oleg Stavrowsky was born in Harlem, New York to Russian immigrants. His interest in art began while he was attending high school, though he managed to finish only two years of high school. He was drafted into the Army at the age of 18, serving honorably in Europe during his four-years as a soldier. After the war Stavrowsky said, “I fooled around with ten thousand incidental jobs and finally when I was about thirty, decided I liked graphics. I started out as a draftsman, then I got a pretty good job as a technical illustrator and I was really cooking with McDonnellDouglas Aircraft. Then I got interested in fashion drawing and got into free-lance commercial art.”

Stavrowsky recalled it was a visit to the Cowboy Hall of Fame in Oklahoma City that convinced him to give up commercial illustration and move to Santa Fe, New Mexico to pursue Western art. “One day back in about 1969, I was in Oklahoma City, and decided to see what was happening at the Cowboy Hall of Fame. I liked what I saw and made up my mind that I'd like to give that a try. I guess we all like Cowboys and Indians. It was pretty successful right from the start.” Within a year his work was exhibited at the Cowboy Hall of Fame. Eventually Stavrowsky moved from Santa Fe to the Texas Hill Country just outside Austin, where he lived and worked for the rest of his life. Though he once said, “I turned out to be a real country hick. I have no desire to live in the city anymore,” his taste in music and his work environment were anything but country. He described his studio environment this way, “One big factor in my life is jazz. When I paint, I am listening to music. Sixty-four bars of good saxophone is like four square inches of good brush licks on a canvas.” And, somehow the combination of his love of jazz and his life in the Hill Country of Texas inspired Oleg Stavrowsky to produce Western art much sought after by collectors.

While subjects of Stavrowsky’s paintings include jazz musicians, automobiles, oil fields, and even abstract subjects, it was his love of Western Art that brought him the deepest sense of satisfaction, which he described this way, “Western painting is my life, my income, my joy, my everything."

CUTTING ONE OUT Oil on Canvas 37 ¼ x 24 inches

FREE RIDER Oil on Linen 22 x 34 inches