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.
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