Skip Williamson's Page

"If you're not good enough to be a cartoonist, maybe you can be an artist."
--S. Clay Wilson

In the late 50s Robert and his brother, Charles, published, Foo, a fanzine homage to funny animal comics -- in particular, Pogo -- and "bigfoot" cartoons like Smokey Stover.

But Jay Lynch and I inhabited the anteroom of comics fandom that celebrated satire and bohemian savior vivre. Like the humor of Lenny Bruce and Mort Sahl, and the hip urbanity of Playboy magazine. We had in common wit… Continue

"Sometime's you just have to piss in the sink."
--Charles Bukowski

Before I was employed by Playboy magazine I was hired as a designer (In 1970) by Playboy's Book Division where I laid out books, mainly paper-back collections of cartoons from the magazine.

During that time Robert Crumb made one of his regular trips to Chicago to help Jay Lynch and me put together an issue of Bijou Funnies.

Jay and Jane Lynch, Robert Crumb and I were invited to a reception for the p… Continue

In 2002 I was flying into Portland, Oregon, for a show.

For me the Great Northwest was an alternate universe populated by pale indigenous forest children. Their knit caps pulled low even though it was May. Clothed in surplus army khaki, faded denim, worn plaid flannel, hooded sweatshirts and hemp, they roam the urban tract goateed, pierced, tattooed and hunched against the wet springtime cold. They huddle in small groups smoking cigarettes. They're wall-to-wall in the city's coffee shops slurpi… Continue

When I heard that my defacto boss, Robert Baldi, had been shot dead by Chicago cops one thought crossed my mind. Unemployment.

So I called my friend Bob Post, an art director at Playboy, and arranged to meet him and Roy Moody for lunch. Lunch with these two guys was always a challenging experience. A perilous hike into uncertain territory handicapped only that we are, out of the gate, drunk as skunks. Bouts of drinking that lead to bouts of drinking that lead to heated discourse on the s… Continue