BIOGRAPHY:

Justin Green (1945- ) attended Rhode Island School of Design in 1967 and spent his senior year in Italy where he encountered work by Robert Crumb in an underground newspaper, which inspired him to begin cartooning. "It was an electrifying experience." He had work published in a variety of American underground comics (including Yellow Dog, Gothic Blimp Works, and Arcade) but in 1972 he invented a new genre in comics - confessional autobiographical comics - when he completed his personal thesis on pubescent psychological trauma, Binky Brown Meets The Holy Virgin Mary, which by the mid-1980's sold over 50,000 copies. It recounts his problems in decoding and assimilating the conflicting demands of puberty, religious fervor, and secret personal rituals - a tortured tale of teenage turmoil. Interestingly, it is now known that those demonic bouts with irrational commands that Binky Brown endures are the result of a chemical imbalance in the brain, now known as Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), now a treatable condition.

By the mid 1970's, due to the lack of financial rewards in the underground press, he began working as a commercial sign painter, however a fall from ladder in 1990 lead him back to working as a cartoonist. He has two regular strips: Readers' Sound Experience (replacing Musical Legends of America) for Tower Records' Pulse magazine, and Sign Game for one of the oldest trade journal's in America , Sign of the Times. He also has the occasional contribution to anthology magazines, such as RAW, Arcade, Weirdo, Heavy Metal, The New Yorker, and National Lampoon.

He is married to Carol Tyler, also a noted cartoonist/painter, and lives in Sacramento, California with their daughter, Julia.

Interviews:
Goblin Magazine (?)
The Comics Journal #104 (1986)

Resources:
Article: The Comics Journal #203 (1998)

Musical Legends
Last Gasp, 2004
In these full-color strips from Pulse! magazine, cartoon master Justin Green depicts the lives of some of music's most outrageous legends, from old-time bluesmen to rock and roll icons. Whether it's Robert Johnson's deal with the devil or the drug-filled spiritual quest of Jim Morrison, Green's visual style distills biographical information into entertaining eyefuls, with over 100 separate stories.

Binky Brown Sampler
Last Gasp, 1995
In 1972, Justin Green completed his personal thesis on pubescent psychological trauma, Binky Brown Meets The Holy Virgin Mary, and in doing so invented a new genre of comics - confessional autobiographical comics. Binky Brown recounts his problems in decoding and assimilating the conflicting demands of puberty, religious fervor, and secret personal rituals but there are laughs a plenty in this tortured tale of teenage turmoil.

"Illuminated moments of personal suffering shaped by a master of rueful self-irony."
Art Spiegelman

"A shocking, riotous and absurdly moving memoir of Catholic guilt... An extraordinary achievement: a surreal, bleakly humorous mixture of anti catholic polemic and self scourging confession."
The Top 100 Comics, The Comics Journal #210

Sign Game
Last Gasp, 1995
Justin Green's Sign Game is a collection of 72 cartoons featuring tip's tricks and diatribes about the sign industry which has been published monthly in Signs Of The Times for nearly a decade.

Musical Legends (2004)
Sign Game (1995)
Binky Brown Sampler (1995)