BOBBY LASHLEY: Rob Schamberger Newsletter 17JUL22

All the men just call him "Sir".

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Hi. My name's Rob Schamberger. I'm that guy who paints rasslers. And other stuff. The baddest man in the whole damn town.

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WORDS  

Bobby Lashley’s entrance is one of my favorite things in WWE at the moment. The drums, the stark lighting, all building tension as he displays his terrifying physique until the explosion that brings up the lights and his monster movie-inspired theme music kicks in…it gets me PUMPED every time.

With this painting, I’m celebrating the early part of that entrance where the gladiatorial drums are pounding and the overhead spotlight hits him, highlighting the otherworldly shape he’s in. I did it in a monochromatic blue to match his entrance, but also because I viewed that as an interesting challenge visually and kept it fascinating for myself by using vertical brush strokes to really sell the lighting.

At a show in Des Moines once Bobby went through security before me. The guard asked me if I was staff or a wrestler. “Staff…Wait, you didn’t just ask HIM that, did you?”

“I’m asking everyone. I don’t want to assume!” they laughed.

“Wait. You think THAT GUY is anything other than a wrestler? You think there’s people who look like him just walking around?” We had a good laugh, and Bobby overheard me and laughed as well.

Since then I always tell him he should work out more.

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ICYMI, here's last week's Canvas 2 Canvas episode. Tomorrow's will go up on WWE's YouTube channel at 11AM CST!

UPCOMING VIDEOS  

• Liv Morgan

• Cora Jade

• Veer Mahaan

Card subject to change.

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Hundreds of prints and paintings at Schamberger Labs!
Rob and Jason Arnett's novella Rudow Can't Fail!
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Shirts and prints at WWE Shop.
Signed prints at WWE Auction.
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Twitter
Instagram
YouTube

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SCHAMBERGER LABS: THE SERIES!

Season 1 Finale! I finish up my grand painting of Charlotte Flair, and am joined by Katy to talk about the piece and its importance to us.

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IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

I spent twelve weeks working on this 30” x 20” acrylic painting of Charlotte Flair, challenging myself to make my most involved, detailed and ambitious piece to date. I’ve never spent this amount of time nor applied this level of intricacy to a piece, to make a ‘major composition’ on this scale. I’m super proud of it and am excited to share the finished piece with you now.

On Canvas 2 Canvas, as a sort of Midwestern modesty when I reveal the final painting I’ll say, “Not bad!” But this time around? Damn it, this time it’s something special for me. I hope it means as much to you as it does to me.

Prints are available here. The initial week’s orders (through 7/20/2022) will be numbered and signed by me and are only available to newsletter subscribers. After the paywall, there’s also a discount code for paid tier subscribers to get $15 off the print. Yeah. That much. Membership costs $7 and you get $15 off the Charlotte prints, plus 25% off all other prints. Seems like it might be a good deal. Finally, ‘founding member’ subscribers will get theirs for free, exclusively hand-remarqued by me.

This is the first big thing for you, the awesome person who’s subscribed to my newsletter who hangs out every week and is just generally wonderful. Thank you!

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WHAT I LIKED LAST WEEK

What We Do in the Shadows came back for its fourth season and DOES NOT disappoint. The bit about Nandor on a container ship had me howling, plus the ongoing bit about “No, that’s not Collin Robinson. That’s the creature that crawled out of Collin Robinson’s dead corpse,” is phenomenal. We’ve got a mix between Grogu, the Ooga-Chaka Baby and Collin Robinson that’s not to be missed, yo.

The new collection of Paris by Andi Watson and Simon Gane is really gorgeous. Somehow I missed out on this series when it originally came out and am glad to get this wonderful new collection. It’s essentially Romeo & Juliet but two young women in 60’s Paris, with the deft characterization Watson always brings to characters and lushly stylized art from Gane. Love it!

Crimson Cage by John Lees and Alex Cormack is a rad pro wrestling graphic novel that reimagines the tragedy of Shakespeare’s MacBeth as taking place in the world of 1980’s territory-era wrestling, primarily in Deep South. A local champion is met by swamp witches who tell him that if he kills the world champion he will himself become a legendary champ. He’s goaded on by his wife who has her own ambitions and yeah, this is REALLY well done with a ton of respect. Cormack’s art is gritty and dynamic and full of character, bringing all of this to life in a wonderful way.

I just finished listening to the the Sammy & Dean season of the You Must Remember This podcast by Karina Longworth, focusing on the lives and careers of Sammy Davis, Jr and Dean Martin. She gets into Martin & Lewis and the Rat Pack of course (hooooo-boy does the Rat Pack stuff not hold up, unless you’re a fan of racist homophobic jokes) but it’s the deep dive on Sammy in the 70’s that blew my mind. Campaigning for Nixon, producing porn, becoming a Satanist and having raw dog orgies with Linda Lovelace? I wasn’t ready, Freddy.

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YOU GOOD?  

It’s rough at the moment here at Stately Schamberger Manor, honestly. We’re waiting on results for some frankly scary stuff for Katy and I’ve got some behind-the-scenes career stuff going on that keeps getting more complicated. We’re doing our best to be empathetic with one another while also maintaining boundaries to not get overwhelmed. We’ve been in this spot for a few weeks now, like we’re just staring at Schroedinger’s Box and waiting for the time lock to activate before we can open it.

That’ll happen this coming week. We’ll find out whether it’s yes or no, stay or go, and we’ll take appropriate action from there. Either of these things would be monumental shifts on their own, but that they’re happening at the same time is weighing a lot at the moment.

So, we’ve been practicing self-care to the best of our abilities and utilizing the tools we’re learning in both our individual therapies and together in couples therapy. Gliding between emotional fusion and differentiation, being there for one another but not sublimating in the other’s needs.

That kinda stuff. We’ll find out what’s going on and then take the appropriate steps forward.

So that I don’t end on a downer note, let’s have a talk about how Charlie Day was apparently the drummer for Prince & the Revolution.

Love you more,
Rob

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EXCLUSIVE PAID SUBSCRIBER CONTENT

First up, through today your first month on the paid tier is only $5. Not bad.

Paid subscribers this week will get an exclusive 25% off discount code for prints, a list of the coming week’s signed prints at WWE Auction, and 24 hour advance access for the original Bobby Lashley painting. WE ARE GO FOR PAYWALL.