We've got a new way to bring you previews and teasers: Flickr just launched this embeddable combination video/photo slideshow thingy. It's pretty sweet, especially when you make it full-screen by clicking the icon at bottom right. Here's The Portable Frank by Jim Woodring; click here if the slideshow won't display above, or just to see a larger version.

The Portable Frank
By Jim Woodring

A Visionary work of comic art for all-ages! Readers who haven’t discovered Jim Woodring’s Frank stories have a colossal treat waiting for them in this all-ages gem collecting the character’s greatest adventures.

Frank is a unique, visionary comic, exquisitely drawn and so fully realized that adults and children alike find themselves drawn deeply into Woodring’s hallucinatory mindscape. The stories, almost entirely wordless, are told with brilliant, candy colors that people of all ages find alluring. The stories themselves unravel like a good puzzle, rewarding re-reading, providing an experience as immersive as that first love affair, that first samadhi, or that first breath. Simply put, the world of Frank must be experienced to be understood.

Frank is an 11-year-old generic anthropomorph who lives in a force-laden landscape called the Unifactor. He is curious but not smart, naïve but not noble, and his most outstanding character trait is his ineducability. Along with Pupshaw, Frank’s semi-subservient housedog-like godling, the two traipse across their surreal landscape, occasionally encountering Manhog, the bloated bladder of sin with a heart of radiance who exists to thwart their prosperity. And then there’s the platonic Jerry Chickens, and the lachrymose Lucky, as well as Frank’s Real Pa and Faux Pa, each a part of one of the great cartoon achievements of the 20th century.

For all its mystery, the world of Frank is a simple, delightful, mesmerizing example of world-building at its most fanciful, surely to delight parents and children alike.

Jim Woodring originals now for sale at Comic Art Collective. Surely not to last long.

I stumbled across both these links today, and was going to include them in tomorrow's "Blogosphere roundup," but decided they deserve their own post: Woodring Simulacra is a blog compiling images of real-world "things that look like Jim Woodring made them up," and Jimland Novelties is a Flickr user who is posting images of an incredible collection of Woodring rarities and ephemera, with Jim's permission.

From Jim Woodring comes word that our pals at Strangeco have created an online gallery of Jim's panel-cartoon-of-sorts that used to run in The Stranger a few years back. Oh yes.

Jonathan D. Howells is putting the finishing touches on a long-simmering documentary about Jim Woodring. In the course of doing this he discovered that he does not have signed releases from two of the people of who are prominently featured, at least for one shot, in the version he has put together. Since he really wants to keep these clips in, he's hoping the two can step forth and identify themselves, and sign the release -- or if you know them, notify them or us! (Contact Jonathan directly at johnadhowells [at] hotmail.com.)

This woman was at a signing held at Confounded Books in Seattle about six and a half years ago (a co-signing with Jim and Charles Burns):

 This man was at LA's Meltdown Comics about six years ago:

Your must-read of the day: Jim Woodring calls it the single best piece of writing about Frank that he's ever read. What more need you know? 

Oh, and check out this prototype for Jim's next Presspop vinyl masterpiece, Kaiju:

Our esteemed friends at Payseur & Schmidt are taking pre-orders on a fantastic-looking and sounding new book project by Paul DiFillipo and Jim Woodring. You can even read an excerpt at their site.

Here's a detail of a detail that Jim Woodring posted on his blog of his contribution to Jacob Covey's forthcoming second Beasts! book. Whoa:

More Flog! Photo Friday, this time with audio! Last night at the Frye Art Museum in Seattle, moderator Gary Groth was joined by Peter Bagge, Ellen Forney, and Jim Woodring for a lively discussion about Robert Crumb and a range of related topics. More photos can be seen on Flickr, in regular and slideshow styles.

Plus! Download the complete audio of this event (24.5 MB MP3). It's a bit low-fi, but mostly intelligible. (We are still working on bringing you a full-fledged podcast... stay tuned for that.) We've also archived this feature on our website at this page.