Luis Royo Art Prints

Luis Royo was born in Olalla, Spain, in 1954. After studying painting, decoration and interior design in the Industrial Mastery School and the Applied Arts School in Zaragoza, he started to work on interior design studies between 1970 and 1979. Meanwhile he also took part in collective painting exhibitions in Spain. In the 1980s, his involvement with comics and book covers began. Several of his stories and illustrations were published in works such as: Comix International, Rambla and El Víbora. This work took him to the US, UK, Sweden and other countries, where he worked for Tor Books, Avon, Bantam Books, etc. His outstanding work for Heavy Metal magazine became more noticed and served to popularize his name. In the 1990s, he started to become quite famous as an influential illustrator, and his illustrations of sexy, but powerful women, in the style of Boris Vallejo, consolidated his international career. After the publication of "Women", his first book of illustrations, his works started to appear almost everywhere. He still did illustrations for book covers. And that was when he diversified his style, making pictures for several of the most famous sci-fi/fantasy publishers in the US such as: Ballantine Books, Daw and Harper. His work became featureed in calendars, posters, tarot cards, t-shirts, and in stories as varied as the Star Trek series and Marvel's Fleer Ultra X-Men. When Heavy Metal magazine celebrated its 20th anniversary in 1997, Luis Royo, one of its most famous illustrators, had an entire gallery dedicated to him. And best of all, was invited to create the cover illustration of the anniversary edition. His work can continue to be seen in his books such as: "Dark Labyrinth", "Dreams", "Prohibited Book I & II", "Evolution", "Conceptions I & II" and many others. Most recently, he has also started reproducing some of his earlier pieces in sculpture.