About me

Rob (R.J.) King is a digital fine artist, illustrator, and independent author based in Madison, Wisconsin. His visual work embraces loose contemporary realism, using economical, expressive brushstrokes to capture the defining characteristics of a subject without sacrificing its recognizability. Whether creating dynamic portraits, caricatures, or conceptual artwork, King is interested in the intersection of recognition, interpretation, and transformation.

From 2001 to 2012, King served as a resident graphic artist for several military units, designing everything from T-shirts and commemorative coins to billboards and posters. His subsequent work expanded into commissioned digital portraits, caricatures, logos, tattoo designs, and print-on-demand apparel. In August 2020, he founded Rob King Illustration, LLC, with a mission to make dynamic, gallery-quality artwork accessible to the general public through affordable canvas prints.

That same year, his piece Summer’s Flame received the Diplōma Honorificus from MADS International Art Gallery in Milan, Italy. In February 2021, he was invited back to participate in the gallery’s Love My Body exhibition, for which he created a series of five works.

In 2021, King shifted his focus from traditional portraiture and cartoon illustration toward caricature, discovering a creative direction that continues to fuel his work. His ongoing series, Don’t Be Meme to Me!, explores the nature of memes as self-replicating units of information. By translating these cultural artifacts into caricatures, King examines how an idea can be duplicated while simultaneously evolving through reinterpretation. The result is an ongoing investigation into the ways images, ideas, and cultural symbols mutate as they move through the collective imagination.

King’s creative pursuits extend beyond the visual arts and into fiction. Having begun writing in 2019, he has since self-published two novels and is currently working on a third: a historical fiction exploring the possibility of Constantine the Great choosing reason over religion.

Across both his visual and literary work, King is drawn to the ways people construct meaning, negotiate belief, and make sense of the worlds they inhabit.

Away from the easel and the page, King lives in Madison with his wife, his spawn, and the ghost of his dearly departed dog. He invites readers, art enthusiasts, and the merely curious to follow his ongoing creative journey on Instagram, where his work continues to evolve one brushstroke, one character, and one questionable idea at a time.

If you like what you see, and want something of your own, click on “Contact”, located in the top left drop-down menu.