Arturo Torres (artist)
| Arturo Torres | |
|---|---|
| Occupation | Artist, illustrator |
| Notable work | The Rap Year Book: The Most Important Rap Song From Every Year Since 1979, Discussed, Debated, and Deconstructed |
| Home town | Dallas, Texas |
| Website | arturodraws |
Arturo Torres is a Dallas-based artist, notably collaborating with Shea Serrano on the 2015 New York Times best-selling book, The Rap Year Book: The Most Important Rap Song From Every Year Since 1979, Discussed, Debated, and Deconstructed. Torres illustrated Serrano's text. Serrano and Torres have a second book forthcoming in October 2017 entitled Basketball (and Other Things): A Collection of Questions Asked, Answered, Illustrated.
Torres grew up in the Garland suburb of Dallas, Texas. He was drawn to art from early childhood, with friends asking to buy his work as early as middle school. High school was his first encounter with working artists: he told Complex Magazine, "I went to this gallery and saw this local artist...I was just amazed by it, because I had never seen a real artist or someone who was doing it for a living."
Torres began his career working a day job managing a co-working space, but was also pursuing art, including designing flyers for bands and DJs.
Writer Shea Serrano saw one of Torres's flyers in the course of writing the text for his forthcoming book, The Rap Year Book. Three months from the due date, Serrano still had not found an illustrator, until he saw a flyer announcing a performance by Dallas rap group The Outfit, Texas. As recounted to Texas Monthly, Serrano thought immediately, "This is the exact style that I'm trying to find." He contacted the group's management asking for information about who had made their flyer, then tracked Torres down on social media, and Torres agreed to work on the book.
The Rap Year Book was published on October 13, 2015, and repeatedly made New York Times best-seller lists.
Torres and Serrano have continued to collaborate, in 2016 developing a weekly newsletter called "Basketball (And Other Things)" that had 21,000 subscribers as of May 12, 2016. The newsletter is both ad-free and also free to readers, but the audience continually asked to donate to support the work. Usually offers were staunchly refused (Serrano would post screenshots of PayPal refunds issued to supporters who tried to send money anyway), and when the team has occasionally relented, contributions from readers have often been given away to charity.
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