Christian Russo crafts illustrations that seem to both utilize and parody elements from popular culture. The Chicago-based artist blends multiple approaches to each aspect of a work, showing an ability in emulating tattoo art, comic characters, realism, and other styles.
His work also seems to find its way to the bodies of fans as tattoos, often posting them on his Instagram page. His humorous pop pieces have been found on album covers, magazine pages, and other outlets. On the below piece, the work took an unusual path: “Coincidentally I made this design before a Chicago based band named ChinaRose took it off my hands,” the artist writes. “They ended up using it as an EP cover and got lapel pins made out of it.”