VISUAL TALES: For the record, your real name is AUSTIN STOLL. How did the name/brand identity AUDI BIZAR come to be? 
AUDI BIZAR: My friend just started calling me Audi and Audi started to become my nickname in high school. (No relation to the car brand). Later on, when I made up my own spelling of the word “Bizaree” into “Bizar” that signified my friend group, my clothing brand, and my other artistic practices. 

VT: Did entering the world of modeling help you discover the possibilities of merging art and fashion together?
AB: I strongly believe fashion + design go hand in hand in the art world. Specifically in my case, painting and drawing. The first time I remember creating anything garment-wise, it was made out of necessity. I was desperately looking for t-shirts with movie quotes from my favorite films. After searching and finding nothing, I came up with the idea of simply writing the quote myself on scrap fabric my grandma had lying around. That’s how creating garments of my own came to be. Modeling definitely had an impact on the way I looked and it incorporated fashion and art. Although I already had a big interest in clothing and fashion design before modeling, the benefits of modeling opened my eyes to new possibilities such as using images of my artwork to create custom fabric. 

VT: Under Audi Bizar, you have produced two BIZAR fashion shows of your own (in Buffalo, NY) presenting your clothing collections. How that came to be and what did you learn from doing so?
AB: The two BIZAR shows that were held in Buffalo in 2019 and 2020. It happened for various reasons. One realistic reason was my confidence level of what it takes to put on a fashion show. Having a full year experience of shows and paying close attention to show production, I naturally had a good overall understanding of how they work. Another reason the two were made possible in the first place was my dear friend Dan Helms, of Metagama, a boutique curated archive clothing in Buffalo. Dan was my right-hand man and made the locations of both shows possible. Without his passion and help in making this possible, I would had a super difficult time pulling it off. I also really wanted to show the people of Buffalo, my friends, and others in small cities that you can have your own show showcasing your art without backing and within a budget that works for you. These shows I learned that working with a team and collaborating is imperative to ensuring the best creative process and outcome. 

VT: Tell us about your new exhibition show. (August 25—September 10 at the New Collectors Gallery in NYC)
AB: For my exhibition, you can expect to see a mixture of older and newer canvas and fabric paintings, both oil and acrylic tying into my modeling and fashion background. Additionally, you will see new work by another artist and close friend, Ian de Beer. 

VT: How do you foresee your future?
AB: Having a too specific vision for the life you want as a creative is a bit unrealistic for me. Lately, I have been focused on just getting extremely skilled and good at how I make my paintings. I think the rest will follow much more genuinely, such as gallery shows, artists' residencies, and more people interested in the work, etc. I also believe that doing the unexpected at a gradual pace is more a pleasant way to approach art. As a result, I am trying not to keep a balance in my life or have a unforeseeable future! More exciting that way. Besides, it sucks when you plan for something for a short or long time and it doesn’t work out.