Jim Woodring exposition (May 2000)

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26 May 2000

Starting Friday night 26 May 2000, Galerie Lambiek proudly presented an overview of the work of the American comix artist, illustrator and painter Jim Woodring.

Woodring's fame mainly stems from his marvelous wordless cult comix series 'Frank'. Woodring's "generic anthropomorph" is an innocent creature who wanders through a powerfully charged landscape in a permanent state of wonder: writhing spirits hover, vicious monsters lie in wait and new mysteries lurk behind every hill.

Woodring's images are as accessible as they are refined. They combine the dissimilar - innocence and perversion, the sparkling naiveté of Walt Disney and the dark visionary painting of Hieronymus Bosch and Salvador Dali - to bring out the same kind of powerful and personal result as George Herriman with his legendary Krazy Kat comics. Just like Herriman, Woodring in his work seems to recognize only one natural law: seeing is believing.

Apart from Frank, Woodring further develops his visual language in illustration work and free painting. He has produced album covers for Bill Frisell, The Grifters and Soul Coughing, and recently designed and illustrated an issue of Francis Ford Coppola's literary publication Zoetrope All Story. For the occasion of the Galerie Lambiek show, the artist made a special, limited-edition silkscreen print.

Frank by the river opened on the 26th of May 2000 and ran until early July. The artist was present during the opening for interviews and signings.