KAZUCHIKA OKADA: Rob Schamberger Newsletter 22MAY25

Flaming flowers that brightly blaze.

May 22, 2025

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Hi. My name's Rob Schamberger. I'm that guy who paints rasslers. And other stuff. Weathered faces lined in pain are soothed beneath the artist’s loving hand.

WORDS

Pardon the pun, but I thought it’d be fun to pull back the curtain and show you my process for this new Kazuchika Okada painting. He’s obviously a new favorite of mine to paint, having such a distinctive look coupled with those gorgeous robes he wears. I like to have the design elements of the robe spread out into the compositions with him as that’s fun to do, but I wanted to take it an extra step this time around.

Growing up, for reasons beyond me, I was a giant fan of the 1930’s and 40’s pulp character The Shadow. How and why I was so into something whose heyday had passed by 50 years before I got into it is a mystery, but it happened. Anyway! The magazines his stories were published in had these gorgeous covers and one in particular, ‘The Creeping Death’ by George Rozen is a straight-up masterpiece.

Since I wear my influences on my sleeve, I had fun with this homage to the composition and its color palette with my Okada painting. It’s a subtle thing until you see them together. So! For the half dozen of us that are pro wrestling and 1930’s pulp magazine fans, I hope you enjoy seeing it as much as I enjoyed making it.

UPCOMING AEW/PWT PRINTS

Speedball Mike Bailey
Konosuke Takeshita
Kris Statlander
Josh Alexander
Willow

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

ART I LIKE

Last weekend Katy and I spent a couple days in Chicago and made a point of going to The Art Institute of Chicago, a truly world-class museum that even though we spent four hours there we still didn’t see everything. Over the next several weeks I’ll share with you my favorite pieces I saw.

First up is ‘Self-Portrait (1887)’ by Vincent Van Gogh. We walked into the room where this and a few other Van Gogh’s are displayed and my eyes instantly watered up from the emotion. Katy literally was frozen and started shaking, trying to take in what we were seeing. You spend your whole life seeing these on posters and in books but to see the actual work in person is a special experience.

What’s truly fascinating with his work in person is how sculptural the brushstrokes are. I’d always heard it was so, and I’ve seen similar photographs like the ones I took that try to show it but seeing it up close is magical and enlightening. His paint was often really thick, especially in the areas of import and they move with the forms he’s conveying.

There was a woman standing looking at it with me and she said something to me I commonly hear, “I don’t understand art, but I like looking at this.”

I told her about an interview I heard once with Master Sommelier Doug Frost, who’s one of only about a dozen known people whose tastebuds are developed in a way that he can pick up every note of a glass of wine. He said he’s always asked what a good bottle of wine to drink is and he said, “The ones that you think taste good.” He also said he never spends over twenty bucks on a bottle for his own imbibing, which is hilarious.

Art’s the same. Good art is the art that you like to look at. Does it make you feel something, even if it’s just a short moment of appreciation? Then it’s good art. As an artist, I can go in depth on craft and technique and why something is technically masterful, but at the end of the day it comes down to how something makes you as an individual human being feel looking at it.

The lady said, “Oh, that’s interesting,” and then walked off.

Spikes!

FLOWERS, YO

My bromeliad (I think that’s what it is) has started blooming in the past few days. It’s my first time growing one and I’d actually forgotten what I’d bought. I knew it had some sort of spectacular flower but couldn’t actually remember what to expect, so when this rad spiky bloom started emerging I got really excited! I’ll let you know what it ends up looking like but so far it’s pretty cool.

Love you more,
Rob