{"id":438050,"date":"2026-05-12T15:13:21","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T15:13:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/438050\/"},"modified":"2026-05-12T15:13:21","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T15:13:21","slug":"every-caricature-that-i-create-is-a-challenge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/438050\/","title":{"rendered":"Every caricature that I create is a challenge"},"content":{"rendered":"

Luis Rojas is an artist from Lima, Peru, who has developed a unique caricature style. He cites Norman Rockwell, Aaron Blaise and Will Eisner as major inspirations, and while he now works a lot in Photoshop<\/a>, his style is also heavily influenced by his background in oil painting.<\/p>\n

We caught up with him to learn more about how he got started in art, what shaped the way he works and how he captures well-known faces with such a fresh way.<\/p>\n

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Luis’s caricature of Michael Caine (Image credit: Luis Rojas)How did your journey as an artist begin?<\/p>\n

I was an introverted kid, so the paper and pen were my best friends. I started drawing, and it was a really good way to start connecting with things that I saw through the window. <\/p>\n

Did you study art and illustration in a more formal way?<\/p>\n

I started learning oil painting when I was 17 years old. However, my learning wasn\u2019t from an academy, but from informal ateliers. For me, it was a really good opportunity.<\/p>\n

Here in Peru, art is really expensive to study: the materials, the social connections for the position that you can have, the time that you spend learning. But I knew what I wanted to do. I was painting and I was learning the fundamentals of anatomy, light, texturing, colour, and the canvas that are all so important. When I was going to be a painter, I was learning from still life. <\/p>\n

After that, I was doing portraits. The base of my caricature work is the portrait \u2013 the realistic portrait. Artists ask me \u2018Why do your caricatures look like oil paintings? What is your technique?\u2019 It\u2019s because my base is in oil painting. <\/p>\n

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Luis reimagines iconic characters to find expressive opportunities for colour and texture to create mood and feeling (Image credit: Luis Rojas)What does the art of caricature give you as a form of creative expression?<\/p>\n

I was never really attached to realism. Some artists say that doing realistic things is boring. I don\u2019t think so. I think that the caricature gives you the opportunity to create another level of realism. This I call super realism.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s like fantasy. Fantasy is most important when you want to do art, and fantasy is always connected with human nature. When we\u2019re kids, we\u2019re fantasising about the world. The caricature is like taking that average reality to create another reality \u2013 the super-reality. <\/p>\n

Caricature creates something that you\u2019re feeling, and that makes you read what you see as beyond realistic proportion. But you can see the expression and something that\u2019s connecting and communicating. <\/p>\n

How does an understanding of anatomy contribute to your caricature portraits?<\/p>\n

I\u2019m really concerned about anatomy. First of all, everyone is reading anatomy; it\u2019s just like how everyone reads emotion through facial features. We\u2019re all experts in how we read emotions by the way our muscles are moving, how they\u2019re working. As artists, we can represent them with lines, and that takes experience. It takes time to do that representation on paper, with a pen or with a brush. And it\u2019s so important. <\/p>\n

Anatomy is something that\u2019s complementary with perspective. Then, later in the process, even if you\u2019re working in grey, or black and white, or colours, you need to understand how light works because, finally, light creates the volume and creates the sense of distance. <\/p>\n

Our eyes are the tool to understand how the fundamentals work together, and that understanding creates an immersive experience, allowing us to feel what we are seeing. And that\u2019s amazing. <\/p>\n

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Rhino rider. Consideration of where light falls on a subject is key in Luis\u2019s visual style (Image credit: Luis Rojas)Could you talk us through your picture-making process? <\/p>\n

First of all, there\u2019s always the observation. In the beginning, the most important process is observation because this gives you the sensation. I\u2019ll be feeling nervous. I never know what I\u2019m going to do or how it\u2019s going to end. <\/p>\n

Secondly is the sketching. And there\u2019s not just one sketch. I can do 20 sketches. You\u2019re retouching all the time and you\u2019re fixing what you\u2019re doing. Just like a sculptor, I\u2019m going from the big size to the smaller size. I clean the drawing in the sketch. When I\u2019m creating, I include force lines, and that\u2019s so important. <\/p>\n

I also restructure and refine proportions. I\u2019m always working with edges that coordinate because they\u2019re the perfect guide. Also, if you place the light source in the wrong direction, the expression can be missed. So where you\u2019re going to focus your light is important. <\/p>\n

That\u2019s something Norman Rockwell was always working with. It\u2019s like Leonardo da Vinci said: we\u2019re not painting things, we\u2019re painting the light. <\/p>\n

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Luis’s tribute to anime director Hayao Miyazaki (Image credit: Luis Rojas)<\/p>\n

The decisions that you\u2019re going to make are going to make all the difference to what you\u2019re seeing. It\u2019s not like forcing yourself to be genuine. It\u2019s not like that at all. It\u2019s more like choosing what you want to do because you\u2019re connected with what you\u2019re doing. It\u2019s about taking risks. Art is about taking risks and making decisions. And that\u2019s amazing, because it\u2019s an experience that never ends.<\/p>\n

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Finally, I can go through the little details and elements like the clothes. Those things are so important because they\u2019re telling us something of the storytelling and the total image. When Norman Rockwell was creating his paintings and his illustrations, he was putting a lot of emphasis on movement. And the details are creating the sense of movement.\u201d<\/p>\n

Do you work with pencil and paper or entirely with digital tools? <\/p>\n

I use paper, and then I can take a scan of my finished work. I can take a picture or scan it later, you know, because I feel more free working on paper. It\u2019s more organic, and it feels much more natural to me. But I am comfortable with Photoshop. I work for eight hours every day. This is part of my life.<\/p>\n

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A sense of volume in a caricature is enhanced by lighting, as in this caricature of Yoda (Image credit: Luis Rojas)What artists were a big influence on you?<\/p>\n

There\u2019s an expression that says that everything is connected. And when you create art, everything is a strong reinforcing of what you\u2019re choosing to do. Norman Rockwell was one very strong influence for me in choosing to do caricatures. <\/p>\n

But another influence is Aaron Blaise, an absolutely phenomenal artist from the US. His animals are characters. It\u2019s really amazing that by drawing animals, you can express human emotions so well. Animals are just like humans. It\u2019s universal. We can feel through Blaise\u2019s representations that emotion is everywhere, and that\u2019s something that teaches me a lot.<\/p>\n

For example, I can understand how a plant is bending and giving us a sensation of emotion, telling us the feeling of the moment. I\u2019m working with a lot of respect when I\u2019m doing a caricature and when I\u2019m drawing animals. For me, the most important thing is expressing emotion.<\/p>\n

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Image credit: Luis Rojas<\/p>\n

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Image credit: Luis Rojas<\/p>\n

What are the challenges of working in caricature?<\/p>\n

For me, every caricature that I create is a challenge, but at some point, for me, creating realistic expression is kind of simple in some way. <\/p>\n

I will use this example: you know the song With a Little Help from My Friends? You hear the original version from The Beatles, and then when you hear the version from Joe Cocker, it\u2019s a totally different song. Working in caricature is exactly the same thing.<\/p>\n

You see the reference that you\u2019re taking. But when you see the caricature, it\u2019s not quite the person, but it seems more realistic. It seems more lifelike. And that is the most challenging thing that you can hit when you\u2019re doing a caricature. At least for me, it\u2019s the most difficult.<\/p>\n

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Luis\u2019s portrait of Clint Eastwood as the Man with No Name evidences his super-real visual quality (Image credit: Luis Rojas)What are opportunities like for illustrators and artists in Peru?<\/p>\n

We have a movement, and I think it\u2019s growing. We have growing areas that are giving more opportunities. It\u2019s giving young artists many more opportunities, for example in video games and animation. <\/p>\n

Also, I can see that there are opportunities for comic illustrators. It\u2019s interconnection that\u2019s happening now, and that\u2019s good <\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Jean Reno<\/p>\n

\nImage credit: Luis Rojas\n<\/p>\n

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Emma Stone<\/p>\n

\nImage credit: Luis Rojas\n<\/p>\n

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Joaquin Phoenix as Joker<\/p>\n

\nImage credit: Luis Rojas\n<\/p>\n

What makes a work of art human?<\/p>\n

I think that we\u2019re in a really amazing age. We\u2019re in strong competition with artificial intelligence, because AI is creating images in just a few seconds. But at some point, those images are soulless. <\/p>\n

One imperfect drawing could have a lot of soul. And that\u2019s another important thing that I take from my experience. It\u2019s important to never give up when you make a mistake when you\u2019re doing art. Your mistakes help you to keep growing. <\/p>\n

I keep learning. And that\u2019s something that we\u2019re forgetting: that mistakes are what defines human beings. Human beings are like artists. Every artist feels like a special human being, but actually every human being is a special kind of artist. I say this because artists can be everything. We are in some way humble enough to keep learning. You know, it\u2019s so important to never give up if you make a mistake <\/p>\n

Sign up to Creative Bloq’s daily newsletter, which brings you the latest news and inspiration from the worlds of art, design and technology.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Luis Rojas is an artist from Lima, Peru, who has developed a unique caricature style. He cites Norman…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":438051,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[437,434,435,436,438,146,85,46],"class_list":["post-438050","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-artsdesign","tag-design","tag-entertainment","tag-il","tag-israel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/438050","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=438050"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/438050\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/438051"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=438050"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=438050"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=438050"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}