Panter, Gary 1950–

PERSONAL: Born 1950, in TX; married Helene Silverman (a graphic designer); children: Olive. Education: East Texas State University, graduated, 1974.

ADDRESSES: Home—Brooklyn, NY. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 19 Union Sq. W., New York, NY 10003. E-mail—info@garypanter.com

CAREER: Illustrator and graphic designer. Head set designer for television show Pee Wee's Playhouse; creator of comic strips; commercial designer for periodicals, and of music-album covers for musicians, including Frank Zappa and the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

AWARDS, HONORS: Three Emmy Awards for set design on Pee Wee's Playhouse; Chrysler Award for Design Excellence, 2000.

WRITINGS:

(And illustrator) Jimbo: Adventures in Paradise (graphic novel), Pantheon Books (New York, NY), 1988.

(With Charles Burns) Facetasm: A Creepy Mix & Match Book of Gross Face Mutations!, Gates of Heck (New York, NY), 1998.

(And illustrator) Jimbo in Purgatory (graphic novel), Fantagraphics (Seattle, WA), 2004.

(Illustrator) Satiro-plastic, Farrar, Straus & Giroux (New York, NY), 2005.

Illustrator of comic series "Jimbo," Zongo Comics (Los Angeles, CA), 1995–. Creator of extended comic novels Dal Tokyo and Cola Madnes, and of Internet animated series Phil Donkey and the Fly.

SIDELIGHTS: Gary Panter is an illustrator, designer, painter, and occasional musician. He is perhaps best known for his work as the head set designer for the popular television show Pee Wee's Playhouse, for which he won three Emmy awards. Panter first published his "Jimbo" cartoon series with the punk newspaper Slash, and later with Raw magazine. His internet cartoon series, "Pink Donkey and the Fly," has been published on the Cartoon Network's Web site. As an illustrator, Panter has created artwork for magazines like the New Yorker, Time, and Rolling Stone, and has created album cover art for a number of musicians, including Frank Zappa, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Ian McLagan, and Bongwater. Panter was given the Chrysler Award for Design Excellence in 2000.

In 2004, Panter published the graphic novel Jimbo in Purgatory. With this work the illustrator takes his punk rock cartoon hero Jimbo on a journey through a version of Dante's Purgatorio. During his travels, Jimbo encounters John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Frank Zappa, robots, dragons, and others based loosely on Dante's work. Jimbo passes through each level of purgatory, which Panter has transformed into an "infotainment testing center." Characters quote Chaucer, Dante, Tiny Tim, and the Psychedelic Furs.

Reviewers praised Panter for his work in Jimbo in Purgatory. "Easily the best graphic novel released this year, Jimbo in Purgatory should be read and savored for a long time," wrote a Publishers Weekly contributor. Other reviewers found the book to be creatively entertaining, praising both its language and its artwork. "It guides readers into hitherto unknown realms of graphic and semantic delights," observed Dan Nadel in a review for Print.

The following year, Panter published his next work, Satiro-plastic. With this work Panter reprints sections of his sketchbooks from 1999 to 2001. Many sketches served as a travel journal of sorts as the illustrator traveled through Texas, Mexico, and Brooklyn. The book is not ordered chronologically, but rather is constructed in a random order, sending readers from Texas to Brooklyn and back again within a few pages. Overall, critics and readers responded positively to Satiro-plastic, finding Panter's look inside his own mind and life to be entertaining and compelling. "Panter is an engaging, funny and insightful visual companion, and this work offers an illuminating look into the mind of a creative visionary," commented a reviewer for Publishers Weekly.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Artforum International, April, 2005, Michael Odom, review of Jimbo in Purgatory, p. 193.

Design Week, April 7, 2005, Yolanda Zappaterra, "Profile—Gary Panter: Keep It Surreal," p. 16.

Print, November-December, 2004, Dan Nadel, review of Jimbo in Purgatory, p. 14.

Publishers Weekly, August 16, 2004, review of Jimbo in Purgatory, p. 45; April 11, 2005, review of Satiro-plastic, p. 36.

ONLINE

Gary Panter Home Page, http://www.garypanter.com (September 29, 2005).

Lambiek, http://www.lambiek.net/ (September 29, 2005), biography of Gary Panter.

United Mutations, http://www.united-mutations.com/ (September 29, 2005), biography of and interview with Gary Panter.