How did you discover your passion for illustration and get started in the field? I don’t think it was exactly a discovery; I started drawing nonstop as soon as I was able to hold a crayon in my hand. Looking back, I was an introverted child (as most artists are), so I think I always felt the need to express myself through art—way before I knew I was making art.

What personal experiences have most influenced your style? I was born in south Brazil in 1978. The setting for my childhood was the last few years of a decades-long military dictatorship. Although the difference between that and our eventual democracy was hardly noticeable to me as a six-year-old kid, I do remember watching everything live on TV—the news reporting on rights movements, protests in the streets and military police everywhere.

That ended up mixing with all the goodies the 1980s had to offer: pop music, blockbuster films, Saturday morning cartoons, superhero comics, fantasy books and video games. The sweet and the sour were always side by side and kind of complemented each other in a weird way.

One series of yours I really admire is your collection of posters for Taylor Swift’s album The Tortured Poets Department in which you depict her in references to films from the ’80s and ’90s. What inspired this series? It’s odd because I started the Butcher Billy persona as a way to unload creativity and dabble with subjects I was always a fan of—in music, cinema and comics, among other arenas. You’ll see a massive amount of post-punk references in my work, for example, because it’s my favorite genre. With this project, I wanted to challenge myself and see if I could work on a subject of whom I wasn’t necessarily a fan and didn’t know a lot about—something that people would never think they’d see in my work. That’s how I came up with the idea to do Taylor Swift. My girlfriend is actually a “Swiftie,” as they say, and she helped me out with some ideas at the beginning.

Another project of yours I admire is your work promoting Stranger Things season four for Netflix and series creators Matt and Ross Duffer. What was it like to work on this social media campaign? Well, it all started when I released art inspired by the show. It didn’t take long until it caught the attention of the people at Netflix. I became a collaborator in smaller projects until the fourth season was about to be released. They called me and said the Duffers were fans of my work; they actually had printed them out and hung them on the walls of the writers’ room. That was quite the compliment.

For the project, they were looking for ’80s-style movie posters for each new episode. They wanted a departure from the usual art made for the series in which you see all the main characters grouped together. Instead, they wanted pieces that would act more as teasers for each chapter. They wanted me to play with the iconography, symbols and specific elements from the show, focusing more on the gory and scary scenes without giving away too much of what happens.

I was given early screenings of each episode before it was released. They were still work-in-progress versions with unfinished special effects as post-production was still going on. I was absolutely free to pick ideas and whatever I thought worked best. And you can tell that from the final result, as the campaign broke the barriers of social media to become billboards on Los Angeles’s Sunset Strip as well as a range of products for sale. People were even asking me for permission to get tattoos of the pieces, which is crazy if you think about it.

Beyond clients in the entertainment industry, you also work for brands outside of this sphere, such as in the beverage industry. How do you incorporate your comic- and film-inspired style into work for those clients? That’s actually a question I ask myself every time an unexpected client offers me a new project. A while ago, there was a month when my clients were a pizza place in Rio de Janeiro, a cleaning service franchise in Canada and the Ministry of General Entertainment of Saudi Arabia. Why I caught their individual attention, I’ll never know. I just think I’m lucky that I developed a style that such distinct clients feel it’s the right fit for them.

Aside from the two we’ve talked out, what have been some of your other favorite projects that you’ve created? Probably the Black Mirror projects I was involved in—those were pretty mind blowing for me. These presented a lot of firsts for me: the first time I signed an NDA; the first time I saw my work printed on cool products, such as vinyl sleeves; the first time I was contacted and complimented by a big showrunner in the entertainment industry; and the first time I got to see my work appear inside episodes of a huge series in a global streaming service. I remember it was only after those accomplishments that I convinced myself I could be more than I thought I could be.

Your illustrations also appear on T-shirts, stickers and fine art prints, among other options for sale. What led you to explore other profit centers than commissions? That actually started before I caught the eye of clients. When I began as Butcher Billy, there were a lot of people asking to buy the pieces I was releasing on social media. So, selling them was quite natural to me at first until the entertainment industry discovered me. Then, my schedule became fully booked by design agencies and marketing departments. Despite that, I still find it absolutely essential to find time to create and release my own work. That’s how I established my style and ideas, and that’s how I caught—and continue to catch—the attention of the industry.

What excites you about illustration right now, and where do you think the field of illustration is going? I never believed in art as a way of living, as I graduated in industrial design and worked in the more corporate side of business for so long. So, I could say that I’m constantly amazed by the simple fact that, against all odds, I get to be an artist and people actually pay me money so I can do what I love. Frankly, I have no idea how I came to this point in the field of illustration, so I could never tell where it’s going.

What would be your dream assignment? That’s tricky. I do work with some big shots and also many smaller ones, and I can say, to me, any assignment where you’re respected and have creative freedom is a dream one. Nightmares are all over this business; it doesn’t matter how dreamy an assignment seems before you take it.

Do you have any advice for illustrators just getting started today? Don’t just work for others. Find the time to create for yourself. ca