Chris Onstad: Uncanny things that make me feel strange happen [in Jim Woodring’s comics]. That’s why I’ve been buying them for 20 years. Actually, I don’t mean to say “buying.” I mean to say “enjoying.”
Comics Alliance: You don’t buy his comics?
CO: No, I buy them, but that’s not my relationship with them. Money is just a means to get happiness.
CA: There are a lot of people who see that notion very differently, particularly in the context of webcomics or digital comics. Money is often seen as a direct expression of one’s enjoyment.
CO: That’s a really artificial and wrong way to describe the things you enjoy about life, by codifying them in the units of money used to get them. Are you really taking joy in something by counting it out in terms of its monetary value, which is arbitrary? Walk around, have a smoke.
CA: Well, I think it’s different if you’re saying that the way you articulate your enjoyment of something is by financially supporting it. Instead of buying versus enjoying, some people might frame it as buying versus illegally downloading something.
CO: That’s sort of a new concept for people. It really struck me — you know the band Vampire Weekend? My friend was like, “Hey, have you heard of them? Let me play you this track of theirs on MySpace!” I listened to it and thought, wow, these kids really did their homework. They sounded like African new wave mod Simon and Garfunkel stuff. And my friend said, “I’m actually going to buy this album!” Then the lightbulb went off, like, oh shit — that’s what people do with Achewood. They say, I’ll buy your merchandise both because I like it and because I want to support the art in my own small way.
