Woodrow Phoenix

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	Photo: © Bridget Hannigan

Biography

Woodrow Phoenix is a writer, artist, illustrator and graphic designer based in London. He is known for his free-wheeling experimentation with illustrative and graphic styles, with message-driven pictures offering up an incongruous mix of the cute and the sinister.

His comic books and strips include Donny Digits - a comic strip which appeared weekly in The Guardian; The Sumo Family, which appeared weekly in The Independent on Sunday and then monthly in Manga Mania magazine; The Liberty Cat, published quarterly in Japan by Kodansha in Morning magazine; SugarBuzz! (in collaboration with co-creator Ian Carney), an anthology comic that was optioned for television by Walt Disney, The Cartoon Network and other independent production companies. In 2003 he directed an animated cartoon based on characters from SugarBuzz!, for The Cartoon Network.

His children's books include Baz the Biz (1999) and Is That Your Dog? (2001) with writer Steve May, and Count Milkula (2006) with writer Robin Price.

For his book, Plastic Culture: How Japanese Toys Conquered the World (2006), he interviewed artists and designers in Japan and China and photographed hundreds of vinyl figures, mascots, dolls and collectibles for a critical appraisal of the world of art toys and designer vinyl.

His latest book, Rumble Strip (2008), pushes the construction and narrative possibilities of the comic strip in an entirely new direction while exploring the complicated psychology of the relationship between people and cars; how we navigate the world and how we relate to each other with and through machines. It was reviewed in The Times as 'One utterly original work of genius. It should be made mandatory reading for everyone, everywhere.'

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Genres (in alphabetical order)

Children, Essays, Fiction, Graphic Novels, Illustration, Literary journalism, Non-fiction

Bibliography

It's Dark in London   (contributor)   Serpent's Tail, 1997

Baz the Biz   (with Steve May)   Mammoth, 1999

Eager Beaver   (with Ian Carney)   Slab-o-Concrete Publications, 1999

Sugar Buzz: Live at Budokan   (with Ian Carney)   Slab-o-Concrete Publications, 1999

The Slab-o-Concrete Inactivity Book   (with Craig Cohen)   Slab-o-Concrete Publications, 2000

Is That Your Dog?   (with Steve May)   Mammoth, 2001

Reading Lights   (contributor)   Gaskell, 2001

Where's It At Sugar Kat: The Thin of the Land   (with Ian Carney)   SLG Publishing, 2002

Kitsune Tales   (with Andi Watson)   SLG Publishing, 2003

Sugar Buzz: Your Ticket to Happiness   (with Ian Carney)   SLG Publishing, 2005

The Brighton Book   (contributor)   Myriad Editions, 2005

Count Milkula   (with Robin Price)   Mogzilla, 2006

Plastic Culture: How Japanese Toys Conquered the World   Kodansha Europe, 2006

Rumble Strip   Myriad Editions, 2008

For Cultural Purposes Only   (film - contributor)   Animate Projects, 2009

Read about books by Woodrow Phoenix at encompassculture.com - the British Council's book database and global online book club

Buy books by Woodrow Phoenix at Amazon.co.uk

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Author statement

The magical quality of the drawn image (ideogram, logo, cartoon, diagram) and the way in which reductive marks can somehow add up to more than just lines  fascinates me. A drawing brings a new reality to life which can have incredible resonance considering how simple the tools are. In a way all comics drawing is metaphor, is symbols made into characters. Cartoons and caricatures are ways to reconfigure information. They capture emotion. They represent what is unseen, they 'look how things feel'. I believe there are still huge areas of potential untapped in the comics form, partly because the subject matter has been so constrained by commercial demands that neither creators nor readers were able to imagine where the form could be expanded.  

I am concerned with finding new ways to make the invisible visible. To bring to conscious attention so much of what passes unseen and unquestioned in everyday life. To examine the ideas that get taken for granted and perhaps find a different way to see what might seem exhausted. Sometimes this just means finding a new way to draw something. Other times it may mean finding a new way to present information. My most recent book, Rumble Strip, uses no characters at all and addresses the reader directly through narrative captions. This approach has not been previously used in a comic book, as far as I know. It seems odd at first but eliminating the fictional construct of a protagonist leads to a more direct and far more visceral experience. Many readers who have little familiarity with the comics medium have been surprised by how effectively this works. As a non-fiction technique it has all kinds of possibilities and it is  one direction that I will continue to explore.  

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Further reading on this site

New Authors on site January 2010
The following authors have been added to the site for January 2010 : Ardashir Vakil Andy Diggle Fflur Dafydd Woodrow Phoenix more...   (11/02/2010)

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Contact information

Publisher (General enquiries) Myriad Editions 59 Lansdowne Place Brighton  BN3 1FL Tel: +44 (0)1273 720000 Fax: +44 (0)1273 720000 E-mail: info@myriadeditions.com http://www.myriadeditions.com

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Related links

http:/ / www.myriadeditions.com/ ?location_id=30

http:/ / www.woodrowphoenix.co.uk/

http:/ / entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/ tol/ arts_and_entertainment/ books/ book_reviews/ article4682030.ece

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