Perusing my local indie comic shop a few weeks ago, I came across a strange comic called Ruff Haus which caught my eye. Its cover featured a strange cartoon cowboy holding a water ski handle and a martini and amusingly lurid headlines like, “Horny Hungarian Honchos,” “Body Dysmorphia on Vacation!”, and “Privileged Youth Driven to Gay Death!”

My interest piqued, I opened it up to find a bizarre mixture of content, from porn spreads illustrated with strange 90s-era computer generated figures instead of actual porn stars, hilariously overwritten sex stories (“My jocks were moistened by the telegenic dew broadcast from Jim’s glistening shoulders”), all surrounded by reproductions of 80s and 90s gay porn ads for now-defunct phone sex lines. I bought both issues of Ruff Haus and went home to read and laugh at the bizarre post-internet brilliance of this super weird creation and wonder who was behind it.

Turns out Ruff Haus is the brainchild of a very handsome 24-year-old named John Gutierrez, who grew up homeless in Florida before coming to New York to attend SVA. Though Gutierrez is gay, he’s part of a crew of outsider artists from Florida who recently have been getting attention for an even weirder book called Square Dance at Palms Promenade that features strange animation and bizarre comics that share an aesthetic with Adult Swim fare like Tim and Eric. In truth, I found myself completely confused throughout much of my interview with Gutierrez, and at times wondered if he was fucking with me, or if it was just a chance to say weird shit and goof on the serious interviewer’s questions and get a free fruit salad. But by the end I came to feel there was a hilariously deranged sincerity to what he was telling me, and even if it didn’t make any sense, I kind of appreciated the refreshing break from reality we made during the 40 minutes we spent together, discussing Nestle Quik hooker parties, hiring teenage street gangs to walk the streets, and Donald Trump’s bodyguards.

Adam: Where are you from, John?

John Gutierrez: Del Rey Beach, Florida. It’s in between Lake Worth and Fort Lauderale. Forty minutes north of Miami.

Do you call Ruff Haus a zine or a comic?

It’s been lazy right now but we’re trying to turn it into the Village Voice for go-go boys. We know now. We just turned into an LLC so now we have two interns and they’re Asian so they work all the time even when I don’t tell them to. We get emails from go-go boys all the time, 'cause we have this guy who I barely know who prints them for us and he leaves them at The Cock and Chelsea Market. He leaves them on racks in front of gay murals in Brooklyn and stuff like that.

When you say you’re trying to turn it into the Village Voice for go-go boys, you’re talking about the back section where all the hooker and masseur ads are?

Yeah.

And you want those ads to be real instead of the vintage porno ads you have in there now?

Something like that. I want it to be somewhere that people can go to, a kind of loudspeaker for people to go to and say there is something that’s going on, that’s sexier than what New York City is providing, and it’s cheap or free and here’s how to do it. We want to get a younger, more underage crowd affiliated, so they know what they’re doing. We want to give it to 18 year old kids who can give it to their friends who are 16 or 17, so we can get them back into the city more.

So you’re trying to lure underage kids to the city more for sexual purposes?

I think New York City needs a muse and what’s really missing is the youth culture. It’s more about office culture in New York City, which is like, kinda tired. It’s been going on since Sex in the City, this whole office culture. I don’t see it going anywhere.

Let’s just talk about Ruff Haus itself. The format of it seems like it’s an art zine. What did you want to make when you started to make it?

When we started it was that Village Voice thing, something to see on the floor of the subway. Just something that could become part of the city. All the artists are straight besides myself and my other editor who’s Brandon Moore. They do their depictions of gay life and the gay fantasies because they live in the city. I think they’re a little more provocative than what a gay person would say right now. I think gay people are trying to come off as coy, now. They have a fake shyness and fake reserved-ness that really should be unveiled. No more airbrushing stuff. So that’s what I like about having all straight artists do it. They do it fast because they’re not — wait what was the question?

What did you originally want to create when you created it? Because I understand the Village Voice thing, every page is littered with vintage porno ads on the sides, but the interior is art pieces, spoofs of old gay porn, and spoofs of the kind of gay magazines that exist today. Mock porno stories filled with wonderfully crazy dialogue. It’s deranged.

I mean I never really read the Village Voice. It’s just something that you see on the ground, and you’re like, oh, the Village Voice. Trash on the street. That’s what I wanted Ruff Haus to be. I have seen it on the street as trash. A couple blocks away from my house. I was like, I guess I’m done, that’s why I’ve been really slow with the work. Then I did a Fire Island issue, the second issue, so I could try to say that I worked for Fire Island and get some interviews and get free drinks and get into parties and stuff like that. Which I did. The sex party scene was really tired and it wasn’t true. None of that was true.

Hmmmm. But I mean, is there an artistic conceit behind it?

I don’t know what that means. Are you asking if it’s artistic? Is it fine art?

Not fine art, but is it like other zines. To me it’s very satirical, very funny, very witty, and the art is appealingly weird. It revels in this kind of bizarre aesthetic that’s very post-internet.

It’s not trying to be artistic. What it is trying to do is be as sincere as it can be. Sincerity has a lot of poetry in it, because you’re really trying to get someone to understand something that you completely feel and you’re kind of enveloped in that world. It just comes off as like, someone’s just pissed all over your page. It’s gonna look weird. Yellow stains. It’s not gonna look like shit in Chelsea galleries right now. I guess that’s why someone would think it was art, but I’ve never really had anybody say it looks like art. People just say it’s hot. There’s cops in it, and stuff like that. The next issue’s going to be The White Issue, all white, like the White Party. There’s gonna be lots of frills and blowing white curtains.

That seems funny and smart to me. An opportunity to spoof White Party culture.

These are just things that are in the gay world, these are gay men’s dreams. A straight guy wants a wife and a girlfriend and a car and he wants to jump people, gay men want white curtains and white sheets and a beach apartment. A vacation home on the beach. They want to be Andy Cohen. Stuff like that. I took molly on the beach in Fire Island. It was the most beautiful day ever. This is going to be in the next issue. There’s going to be a lot about issue 2 in the third one. I was doing molly and there were no clouds in the sky. I was with all these muscle boys and my boyfriend. Then Sarah Jessica Parker starts walking down the beach with flowing clothes, looking like Aphrodite or some shit like that. I kept saying the day was God's gift to gays.

Was she really there?

Yeah. She was there with Andy Cohen. She was there for five days. The whole time I was there. She went to the tea dances too, the late-night ones.

Did you interact with her?

I was gonna say to her, “Thank you for making New York City such a great office environment.” All I said was “Thank you.” She said “You’re welcome,” really nicely. But she couldn’t see my face, she was looking for me. I thought it was really nice.

I bought your other book, Square Dance at Palms Promenade. The whole aesthetic you guys have is totally new to me. It feels like stuff that references mid-90’s computer generated art and animation. How did you get involved with that type of stuff?

That book’s made by high school friends from Florida, who are all straight. That’s more on their level. I can only kind of grasp it as much as you can. It’s like the internet’s brain has misfired. But that’s not what that is, its just a means of making imagery and it’s just like sincere and it comes out weird. That’s like the same thing. Sincerity just comes out looking new and different. But it also like ricochets off other things. That book’s like six artists and we each had to pair up so no one did their own work, it was half and half with everybody. What came out was even more of a hodgepodge of that sincerity kind of thing.

And Ruff Haus has the same aesthetic.

Yeah. I can’t remember all the guys names.

Your friends?

Yeah. They’re always changing their names. One of them’s a B and one of them’s a C. There’s this guy Mark. One of them is Mark. He writes the poetry and stuff like that.

Where are you from John? And how did you get to this world?

The gay world?

Yeah, I mean, I’m totally confused by nearly everything you’ve said. I don’t know that I understand much of what you’re saying. I’m really trying to follow you. For instance, did you go to art school? What do you do? Where did you come from?

Oh. I was raised in Florida. My dad owned a framing store that frames pictures and we were homeless so we lived in the back of it. We had inflatable beds that we had to put on the tables. It was really dusty so I grew up malnourished and ugly. I was a really angry kid. I didn’t know I was gay. I had to sleep in the same bed as my mom. I was hanging out with the homeless people in the back. I was going around and skateboarding and meeting strange people. I was never afraid to get into a spot or anything like that, you know? I came to New York because I went to art school for high school and middle school. I got kicked out of the high school one. I didn’t pay attention except in my art classes, but they still kicked me out because my parents didn’t donate money to the school. Then I went to online school and got my GED. I wanted to go to SVA because I thought it was a fun party art school. I didn’t know anything about New York and Manhattan. When I came here I saw what it looked like. For two years I was working on stuff and I was really angry. This was in 2009. I was going out with my friends and we would drink and break stuff. One night I was so angry I was trying to get in fights with cab drivers, and I ended up hooking up with one. That was my first gay experience. Then I would keep going out and breaking things and doing bad stuff, and I would go to places, gay bars after we got done, and I would hook up with guys. I realized I didn’t have to talk to girls anymore which was a godsend. So I just started coming out as gay to everybody. Chelsea and The Eagle and The Cock kind of broke me in. I started going out and playing pool at Nowhere Bar.

So the porn magazine aesthetic was not something as a kid that you were fascinated by? For me when I look at Ruff Haus I’m seeing all the 90’s porn ads that I used to love. I have a huge collection of vintage gay porn in my room.

I’m trying to propel that and use it as fuel to make a new thing for people to look like.

That’s what it feels like. I’m glad we’re finally on the same page.

But that’s not the mindset for why I’m doing it.

Oh. There’s not really a driving force? You’d rather create something weird and ephemeral that gets thrown out in the trash.

No. I just want something substantial enough that it would be in the trash, regardless of whether it’s good or not. But like, I guess the goal is just to get into parties and interviews with people and get free things like food and alcohol and stuff like that.

Is it a scam or a hustle?

Meeting gay men at gay bars, it only gets you to a certain level. Going through art tunnels you meet sexier men, because it’s the new aristocratic thing to be worked out and have perfect teeth. Instead of white hair and wigs you get fillers so you look perfect. Those men are a lot more attractive to me than someone who’s at a gay bar.

You just want a better class of guy.

It’s just a means of networking, is the thing.

Is there an end goal?

There was one but I forgot what it was. Probably the end goal would be to have it mandatory to have it be read by go-go boys. Like how everyone in Brooklyn is reading Eat Pray Love. The go-go boys will read Ruff Haus and be better for it.

When you say “interviews and parties” are you talking about this kind of interview we're doing? You want to get press?

Yeah. Interviews with porn companies would be the best.

What do you mean?

I don’t want to be interviewed by…I don’t know. Interviews as in getting in the reason for the interviews is just to be able to get invited to the Coca Cola industry parties and stuff like that. I don’t know. Like a Nestle Quik party. A big party with escorts and underage people. Stuff like that.

You know, I’m not trying to belittle anything you’re saying, but are you talking about Coca Cola or Nestle Quik throwing a gay party with escorts?

Once it gets to that level it’s not gay or straight anymore. It’s like, uh –

It sounds like all the stuff you’re saying should just go in your next issue. That should be a story for Ruff Haus 3 – about Nestle throwing a gay party with escorts.

Nah. That’s the kind of stuff where you’ll find a person checking your mail and stuff like that. I know somebody who was doing big ad campaigns. He was a big art director, doing some kind of big Mountain Dew campaign. Some kind of sports soda. He said they would have people deliver them cheese platters and stuff like that, but they’d also ask to be invited inside because they had to check stock of your fridge. They bring so much stuff to your house, they’re like a new little paid for maid for you. He found them going through his computer and stuff like that. That’s like, real. I would only want to be, not affiliated, but a friend who people who work there so I could be invited, not have to worry about my reputation. That’s the goal of Ruff Haus. And to be known for Ruff Haus. The big brand thing, those guys will break you in even more. It’s not just New York City anymore. New York City is like the truck stop of the world. I forgot what the question was.

I’m not sure it would help to reiterate it. I’m still confused about what the parties and things that you want to get into are. By the way, I don’t think it’s bad that you want to use Ruff Haus to get into parties, because everybody does their work and wants to be recognized and acknowledged. I’m just interested in where you developed these concepts of parties and other things you want to get into. It’s so far removed from anything I desire.

You can go to an art auction, you fill up on hors d'oeuvres or champagne. You can get a membership to a gym and get a shower every once in a while. I don’t know you can meet people on Grindr to have a place to sleep. You meet people on Scruff to get coffee for free. You can do interviews and get a free fruit bowl. Glass of water. That’s what New York City is really about. I think the office culture is making it so much like it’s a tax write off. So people don’t really feel like they earned it or deserved it. But saying Ruff Haus has brought me somewhere, kind of lets me go to sleep at night, rather than me saying I’m working these people who are working me for something else.

Um…

Not that any of that is so planned out. I’m just saying that as you’re asking me I’m thinking about it. It just comes naturally to do these things.

I don’t want you to come off as really shallow in this interview.

I don’t care because it’s like, Chelsea and it’s New York City and it’s gay people and it’s now. I don’t care. I grew up ugly. I’m blossoming now into a little man. Hopefully I’ll be Mr. Eagle before 2020.

Is that your goal?

That’s the goal. To be Mr. Eagle. But I don’t know how much I have to socialize.

I would assume that the leather scene is a lot about socialization, being in that world. What do you do for work?

I work at a silkscreen factory. Making artist editions and stuff. It’s a big name artist but I can’t say who it is. It’s nice cause I’m learning a lot about color separating and inks and chemicals and stuff like that. I’ve been doing that for two months. Before that I worked at The Standard Hotel restaurant.

And you have a boyfriend?

Yes. It’s monogamous.

So when you were talking about liking these certain types of guys and wanting to get into parties to meet wealthy muscle guys who you’re attracted to, that’s not really the case?

No it’s more about wanting to start a crew. A gay Ruff Haus crew. Oh! This is it, this is the actual goal. So if I became very wealthy and I became a king and had lots of money, I would pay kids – the most good-looking kids from high schools. Suit them up in really nice clothes, so they’ll be the coolest kids in schools. I would just have them hang out in front of local places and say they have to be outside 24 hours. Or they have to be on the strip, and they have to have a name on the back of their jackets. Something like that.

So you would finance faux street gangs of underage kids?

Something like that.

Or you would be their pimp and make them hustle?

I don’t know where it would go. I just know that’s the shell of what the egg would look like. Then whatever they’d do, I know I’ll be a lot more mature so I’ll have the answers of what they’ll do. But right now, they’d just be hanging out and they’d have to jump straight people and stuff like that. Maybe I’d teach them how to vogue. Get them into Muay-Thai, so if they ever get fucked with so they could protect themselves. I could sell them to the Guardians on Christopher Street. The volunteer police force.

The Guardian Angels? I’m not sure they still exist.

I could sell them to the Guardian Angels when I’m done with them.

Do you watch porn now?

I like David Anthony. Have you heard of him?

From Titan.

I also like Brandon Moore’s work. He’s assistant editor for Ruff Haus. He’s the one who does all the trend-setting and the do’s and don’ts.

Who does the amazing faux-porn stories? It’s some of the most brilliantly funny stuff I’ve ever read.

Chris Affection. He lives in Providence now. He was here yesterday to do a book signing. See that’s the thing yesterday, we did the book signing and I got a bunch of free coffee and t-shirts.

But isn’t it more important to move product, sell your zine, make something that people want to read? Why is it so exciting to get free coffee?

It’s more just like, real estate – you buy a shell of a building. Like a dilapidated building in Detroit and you let it sit there. Whether you work on it or you don’t, maybe one day it’ll be worth something. That’s what Ruff Haus is. But it’s also got a lot of heart in it. It’s gonna grow and get a lot bigger.

Does that mentality of hustling and using Ruff Haus to get into parties and get free shit stem from your childhood?

The thing that made me such a hustler was my dad. I would draw all these pictures and show it to him and be like “Isn’t this great, Dad?” and he would be like, “Yeah but you can’t sell that shit. They’re not going to put you on Oprah.”

What are you going to do for the rest of the day?

The rest of the day? I’m going to draw this comic. I have to feed my interns. I’m going to go get fucked upside down by one of Donald Trump’s bodyguards at Trump Towers. One of his hot bodyguards. I’m gonna get face exercises from this Armani Exchange model. He’s gonna teach me how to look like my face is relaxed.

You said you and your boyfriend were monogamous.

Yeah but we have this like, leave a penny, take a penny kind of thing. Like – “You earned this one."

What did you do to earn sex with one of Donald Trump’s bodyguards?

I was just looking really good one day. He said “You look really good today.” I said, “Yeah this guy gave me his number.” He said, “Do it.” I said, “Awesome.

To order Ruff Haus Issues 1 & 2, visit SkunkTrunk.

___________________________

Adam Baran is a filmmaker, blogger, former online editor of Butt Magazine and co-curator of Queer/Art/Film. His short film JACKPOT, about a porn-hunting gay teen, won Best Short Film at the Miami Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, and was recently featured on The Huffington Post, Queerty, and Towleroad, among others. He is a features programmer at Outfest Los Angeles LGBT Film Festival and NewFest in New York. In his spare time, he complains about things to his friends. “Fisting for Compliments”, his weekly musings about the intersection of sex, art, porn, and history, will appear every Monday on TheSword. You can contact him at Adam@TheSword.com and follow him on Twitter at @ABaran999. Check out his previous columns in the Fisting For Compliments Archive.