About

Hi, I’m Rick "RJ" Ruano :) I’m a digital illustrator with a BFA in Drawing from the University of Florida’s College of the Arts.

 

I specialize in figure drawing and sequential art. I consider myself a living collage of my interests: manga, the macabre, gender expression, and the occasional clown. Likewise, my work reflects the same layered sensibility. Across my art, I use the human figure to anchor my exploration of identity, fantasy, and the spaces where beauty and oddity or grotesque collide. Rather than functioning as a formal exhibition, I approach my artwork as a collection of souvenirs. This philosophy draws me toward comics, animation, and tarot, where storytelling and accessibility intertwine.

 

Deeply influenced by my childhood love of manga and anime, I grew up immersed in heightened depictions of romance, violence, and character design. Flamboyance in the media became my visual baseline. Combined with a fascination for the macabre and supernatural, my work allows camp to interact freely with the ghastly. As such, I’m particularly interested in projects that explore fantasy, horror, and character-driven narratives across comics, animation, and illustration.