In January’s MKE Comicbook, we did something we haven’t done in quite awhile – welcomed a guest presenter to the discussion! On this night we had Alex and Rob of R-Rated Clothing come and talk about their company. R-Rated, which is less than two years old, produces t-shirts featuring the artwork of Rob – Roberto Rivera.
I learned of their company this past November at the Local First Milwaukee “Buy Local Gift Fair”. I talked with them at their booth, remarking on how comicbook-ish the art on their shirts seemed, and was delighted to learn that Rob was actually in the process of producing his own comicbook! As soon as I learned that, I knew they had to come to MKE Comicbook.
Alex says, they want R-Rated to “be the company that makes art you wear.” Their first few designs were illustrations from Rob, even including a self-portrait! Knowing how much pride many Milwaukeeans take in the city, and after some feedback from events they’d gone to, Alex and Rob came up with their “414” design to really solidify people’s recognition of R-Rated’s “localness”. Unfortunately, neither Alex nor Rob really cared that much for the design and in short order, Rob created the “Good Beautiful Pleasant Land”.
“Pleasant Land” set the bar for the kind of shirts they want to continue making – well-designed, beautifully illustrated, and oversized images on the shirts! They also have plans to create shirts, the sales of which, will benefit particular causes. R-Rated has big plans, so keep your eyes peeled for them and their dynamic shirts!
(Interlude: Amber brought her sketchbook and shared some neat 1920’s variants on classic Marvel villains) 🙂
He’s been a comicbook fan for quite awhile, starting out when he was a kid. “My dad collected comics, my brothers collected comics. I’m pretty dyslexic, so I really gravitated to the artwork aspect of them.” Like many comicbook fans growing up in the 90s, Rob had much respect for the work of Jim Lee, Marc Silvestri, and his work drifted towards the gritty likes of Mark Texeira, and then towards the outright strangeness of Sam Keith. He also is heavily influenced by his favorite movies, admitting he once went on a Ridley Scott-influenced drawing binge. 🙂
While he mainly works with a tablet computer and the software Manga Studio to draw his “RX” comicbook, he does like to go back to pencil and ink regularly. He mentioned, “…it forces you to live with the mistakes you make…and that can make things good sometimes. It makes me let go of being a control freak and just let things be.”
As for comicbooks, and working as an independent illustrator/designer, Rob’s opinion was pretty straight-forward: “Freelancing sucks. You >have< to be on the grind. You have to constantly be reaching out.”
Besides working on his comicbook “RX” (which he just received a printer’s proof of the latest issue!), he also has a project called “Carlos The Kaiju-Killer”, the origin of which is unique. “I created a fake comicbook cover, just for the fun of it. It got so much feedback though, that I realized I >had< to actually try and make a comic to back up that cover!” You can see more of that at his Patreon
Thank goodness we had Don back tonight, too, so the always-popular comicbook trivia contest could resume! Don changed it up this time, and we got to play from our smart-phones. That worked out real well and hope we do it at future meetups. 🙂
You can find R-Rated Clothing HERE and HERE. As for Roberto’s artwork, check him out HERE and HERE.
