Episode 088: Jim Woodring

I’m not sure where to start with one, but the gallery seems as good a place as any. It was, after all, the reason Jim Woodring was in New York for a particularly cold few days last week. Fine art has been the cartoonist’s focus off and on for the better part of a decade, bouncing between the world of galleries and the paneled pages on which he first made his name. It’s hard to believe, then, that the artist is only now having his first solo gallery showing. Honestly, though, that’s likely the least surprising revelation in this hour long interview. I defy you to have an extended conversation with the artist without having your mind blown a bare minimum of four or five times. Woodring has long used his comics work as a method for exploring his singular vision of reality, beginning in the 80s with the publication of Jim, which explored the artist’s dreams and long standing hallucinations in the form of autobiographical comics. His most beloved work, Frank, was a more fully realized world inhabited by assorted anthropomorphic beings, including the titular buck-tooth hero. The last time I spoke with Woodring, the artist was promoting Seeing Things, a collection of his charcoal drawings that presented an even more direct insight into his visions. At the time, the artist had seemingly turned his back on comics, but has thankfully returned to the medium with even longerform works. These days Woodring works in whatever medium best represents the images he’s attempting to represent as he walks through life, moleskin sketchbook in-hand. I ask to see what he’s been working on during his days in New York City and he happily stands up from his hotel bed and rummages around in his jacket pockets. Woodring is that rare and wonderful sort of interviewee who creates work that requires no additional discussion, yet is perfectly willing to discuss it ad nauseam when the time comes. The result is a frank and fascinating conversation tracing the course of the artist’s career, beginning with his very first frog hallucination.