Hi. My name's Rob Schamberger. I'm that guy who paints rasslers. And other stuff. Younger than the mountains, growin' like a breeze.

1929 French Art Deco Fashion Study

Watercolor on 9” x 12” watercolor paper

Some art for art’s sake, doing a painting of a mannequin wearing a vintage outfit. I loved how the shadows fell across the mannequin’s face and gave the impression of an amused expression.

Card subject to change.

Rob’s Art on ShopAEW
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Rob and Jason Arnett's novella Rudow Can't Fail!
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Rob’s prints and shirts at Pro Wrestling Tees
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Bluesky
Cara
YouTube

My wife Katy’s latest book Oldest Kansas City is now ready for preorder! She’s worked really hard on this, doing deep research in all corners of the city to find as many gems and stories as possible.

Here’s the description:

If you’ve met Katy, you know exactly what her unique energy is all about and how passionate she gets about telling the stories of others. Preorders are really important to a book’s success, so it would mean a lot to us if you could get one for yourself. They start shipping on September 1st. Thanks!

Platonic season two started off with a splash. The series is about two people in their 40’s who became best friends in college and are reconnecting now, played by Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne. They reconnected in season one after Rogen’s character got divorced and in this season the overall story seems to be about Byrne’s character not getting along with his new fiance and creating a situation where either the friendship or the marriage won’t make it. Except it’s all hilarious with things like naked old guys running around naked while tripping balls. You know, like real life.

I finished listening to the audiobook for The Night Fire by Michael Connelly, continuing the solid dynamic between Harry Bosch and Renee Ballard working multiple cases, helping one another with the cases and helping each other grow as people. It’s such a fantastic dynamic that Connelly introduced to his books and I thoroughly enjoy it.

I finished up reading the giant Superman: The City of Tomorrow compendium a few days ago. This collects when the new creative teams took over the Superman books at the end of 1999 and there’s some real gems in here. The Ed McGuinness art is what I remembered the most from this time period, but there’s stories by Mark Schultz drawn by Doug Mahnke that are straight up great as well as some remarkable issues written by Joe Kelly and drawn by German Garcia and Kano. It’s overall a mixed bag with high highs and some less-than-interesting lows but it kept me turning the pages throughout.

I’d been eagerly looking forward to reading The Avengers in the Veracity Trap by Chip Kidd and Michael Cho and it exceeded my already-high expectations. I’m a big fan of Cho’s art in particular and this might be some career-best work from him. The premise is that the original Avengers team is fighting Loki, who’s created a reality-threatening portal to the ‘real’ world where the team meets Kidd and Cho to learn that they’re actually comic book characters in this other world. But it’s also a way to talk about how these characters and their stories can positively impact and influence those who read them. It’s a love letter to superhero comics that utilizes the form in ways I haven’t seen before and positively adored. Highest possible recommendation.

Speaking of fun superhero stories, Justice League Unlimited volume one by Mark Waid and Dan Mora is exactly that. Similar to the cartoon of the same name, the concept here is that every superhero on Earth is now a member of the Justice League. This allows them to coordinate and use their abilities for the most good on a global scale. However, a shadowy group works behind the scenes to present a threat for a group of this magnitude. So, on one hand there’s a lot of fun with seeing superheroes doing super things and on the other hand there’s a mysterious threat that creates a through-line narrative to bring it all together. Mora’s art is absolutely killing it on this, taking on a near-impossible job and excelling at it.

Yesterday morning I read Absolute Batman volume one by Scott Snyder, Nick Dragotta and Gabriel Walta. Overall I’m kinda done with Grimdark Batman but this is an interesting ground-up reinvention of the character divorcing him from all of his trappings. It’s a new continuity here where instead of the story we all know about his origins, instead Bruce’s dad is killed in a mass shooting and he’s raised by his mom. They’re not wealthy, more of a lower-middle class, and every familiar face has a wholly new dynamic opposite Batman. Not everything is to my taste but I applaud that they’re really trying to do something new. Also, Dragotta’s art is straight up rad and he’s doing some dense pages that still read very easily. It’s like a mix of Frank Miller’s Dark Knight Returns with some Trevor von Eeden Thriller and a touch of Chris Ware panel layouts. It’s a gorgeous, gorgeous book.

It was a pretty low-key week for me. I had some AEW commitments that pretty much monopolized my time but that’s okay. I made some pretty solid paintings that I’m excited for you to see in a month or two.

But beyond that, not a whole lot to report on. Katy was knocked out by a sinus thing for the past couple weeks and I’ve been working through a depression hole (therapy helps, but sometimes one needs to sit in some discomfort to do that work) for a couple months so we’ve mostly stuck around the house rewatching The Wire for like the 20th time.

And that’s okay.

To reference The Wire’s Stringer Bell, it’s been a week of 40 degree days. Nothing too cold, nothing pleasant or too hot, just kinda there. I can deal with things being neutral right now.

Love you more,
Rob