It ain't easy being a Renegade

This page is all about me!

Not that I think anyone cares, but if you do here is where you will find out more about me than you ever wanted to know. 

A brief history... Well maybe not that brief, I'll try to keep it short, but first a little back-story. I'm an artist, not a weekend warrior or coffee shop artist. No I'm the real deal, for better or worse, mostly worse, I've lived my life as an artist. It's how I define myself, it's what consumes me. For as long as I can remember I've had this worm in my head, driving me to create!

When I was a kid I was always getting into trouble for drawing hot rods, motorcycles, and big boobed cartoon girls on my desks, or anywhere else I could get my grubby little fingers on. No matter how much my teacher smacked my knuckles with her ruler, I just wouldn’t stop. Then one day, when I came to school there was a sheet of drawing paper taped to the top of my desk. When I looked up, astonished, my teacher was standing there in front of me. She just sighed and said, "I give up," and handed me a brand new box of pencils, a box of crayons and an eraser. A renegade artist was born!

Since that day I've been trying to live my life as an artist, to use my talents and skills to create cool shit! I have an AS degree in graphic design, not that I think that matters much, I believe it’s the work you do not the classes you’ve taken. I've worked as a graphic designer for most my life as a way to pay the bills, but it never was enough to quench my desire to do cool shit! It’s never been more than a job.

Although I have always been creative, I struggled for a long time to find focus, to find the medium that could satisfy my desire to create. Not to brag, but artistically I can pretty much do what ever I put my mind to, and I’m always looking to expand my skill set and arsenal of tools.

In 2004 I was asked if I wanted to build a biker magazine for some big shot t-shirt vendors, it was supposed to be kind of an event guide that they would distribute at all the major bike rallies that they went to. I said yes I could do that, and proceeded to build the best damn biker magazine I could.  I did all the graphic design, photography, did the interviews and collected all the content, all the while I was not getting paid at this point, it was one of those deals that if it works out you’ll get paid.  So when I had the finished product, I said here you go, and they wanted me to go out and sell the ads too!  At that point I was like screw that! So I changed the name to Renegade Biker and made it my own.

It was then that I realized I had found the perfect outlet for my creativity, a magazine about all, the cool shit I love, motorcycles, hot rods, and beautiful women, plus all the cool creative possibilities, the graphic design, web design, photography, illustrations, cartoons, and more the possibilities are endless.

To cut to the chase, I've ben publishing Renegade for about 8 years now, it’s about all the things I love and I have been doing the entire magazine all on my own, the graphic design, layout, photography, the website, going to shows and events, selling ads, sleeping in my truck to deliver magazines, on and on. I have done this all on my own with very little help and certainly no financial support.

So here I am sitting in my van frantically working on the final touches of my website about to launch my newest digital issue, and to announce my Zombie Apocalypse tour!  My plan is to travel the country hunting down the coolest hot rods, custom motorcycles, in old barns and garages, and pin-up girls for photo shoots, interviews with interesting people in the custom culture scene. To be published in my magazine and on my websites, Plus hitting up cool events, rallies and concerts to cover and promote my new digital magazine and to produce a documentary film and photo book on the custom culture I’m calling ‘”Custom Culture Circus”.

And you can come along with me and experience the custom culture through my creative lens. Hope you dig it!