Al Rio (1962 - 2012)
Yesterday, as news of DC’s “Before Watchmen” project was engulfing the comic book world, we also learned that acclaimed artist Al Rio was dead. Rio, who lived in Brazil, had taken his own life, committing suicide by hanging himself. Obviously, any time there’s a tragedy like this, it leaves a lot of unanswered questions and volatile emotions. Al Rio had been a comics fixture since the 1990s, earning a reputation for drawing uber-sexy women in a career that spanned pretty much every major and minor comic publisher across the industry. Unquestionably talented, we’ve lost someone special and he will be missed by many.
Al Rio, who’s full name was Alvaro Araújo Lourenço do Rio, was born in Brazil in 1962. His professional art career began in the early 1990′s, when he was hired to illustrate various English text books for a Rio De Janiero school. Before long, Al Rio had become very accomplished in the “Good Girl” style of art. His talents with drawing strong and sexy women landed him a job with Image Comics, where he quickly shot to fame with his work on books like Gen 13 and Wild C.A.T.S. From there, he eventually expanded his professional portfolio, working work at Marvel Comics, Dark Horse, Avatar Press, Chaos!, and Cross Gen. At the time of his death, Al Rio was finishing up his work on the graphic novel Fever Moon, which was supposed to be published this Summer by Random House. No suicide note was left.
Al Rio will be greatly missed and my thoughts go out to his family. Rest in peace, Mr. Rio.
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