Tag: Daniel Johnston

Daniel Johnston – I am a Baby in My Universe II

DiMattio Gallery, September 14 – December 15, 2026

Opening Reception: Thursday, October 22, from 6:00 – 8:00 p.m.

Monmouth University, Department of Art & Design, in collaboration with Deborah Colton, OUTPOST NYC DCG, and Parlor Gallery are pleased to present, Daniel Johnston: I am a Baby in My Universe II.

Welcome to the world, of Daniel Johnston.

Daniel Johnston, a singer-songwriter and visual artist whose childlike, haunted songs brought him acclaim as one of America’s most gifted outsiders. Throughout his life, Johnston suffered from mental illness, yet in the spirit of hope, this helped his work become even more profound in his continuing artistic journey throughout his lifetime. In a career filled with stops and starts, Mr. Johnston became something of a man-child celebrity of the artistic underground, earning the admiration of rock stars like Kurt Cobain and Tom Waits as well as comparisons to William Blake. Johnston became known by fellow musicians and the music press with songs, like “Speeding Motorcycle” and “Don’t Play Cards with Satan,” that had a poignant clarity yet showed glimpses of a fractured mind. Well-known for his strange, cartoonish art that decorated his tapes and were featured in his visual art works, Johnston repeated various images often that were always etched in his mind. One, “Hi, How Are You,” featured a froglike alien; the image became his signature. Winning acclaim for both his music and visual art, his cartoon drawings were even included in the Whitney Biennial exhibition in 2006 at the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Yet, Mr. Johnston was dogged by mental health problems that stunted his career and occasionally hospitalized him. In more recent years he had largely been confined to his family’s home; in 2017, he went on a farewell tour backed by members of the bands Fugazi, Wilco and Built to Spill. With a boyish voice and a gift for pure melody – his biggest inspiration was the Beatles – Mr. Johnston sang candidly and sometimes disturbingly about his demons. “Despair came knocking at my door, and I let her in for a while,” he sang on “Despair Came Knocking,” from “Hi, How Are You.” “She sat on the couch and began smoking. She said nothing.”

Climbing the rungs of the indie-rock world, Mr. Johnston was featured on MTV in 1985, and three years later went to New York, where he mixed with the bands Sonic Youth and Galaxie 500……. then also went on to Europe. Mr. Johnston’s songs became indie-rock standards. “Speeding Motorcycle” … capturing the thrill and fear of passion – “Speeding motorcycle, don’t you drive recklessly/Speeding motorcycle of my heart” – was covered by Yo La Tengo, the Pastels, Mary Lou Lord……..in fact, Johnston has been featured in the NY Times, the New Yorker and countless other magazines worldwide.

In the 2000s, even as Daniel Johnston seemed to disappear from public life, his reputation as a singular artist was growing. On a 2004 compilation album, “The Late Great Daniel Johnston: Discovered Covered,” his songs were performed by Mr. Waits, TV on the Radio and Death Cab for Cutie. The next year, Jeff Feuerzeig’s film “The Devil and Daniel Johnston” won the documentary directing award at the Sundance Film Festival. Mr. Johnston in concert at a festival in Bourges, France, in 2010. As Mr. Johnston’s mental problems mounted – he suffered from manic depression and schizophrenia – he largely withdrew from performing and remained at his family home. Yet, he never stopped writing and drawing. This was a compulsive passion he had to continue to create and never give up. He always had HOPE and LOVE for the future, despite his health.

“I believe in the work of Daniel Johnston in so many ways. He broke barriers and paved the way with light and hope to others who suffered from mental illness, whether it be just depression or something more serious. At a time when people did not talk as much about such things, he gave people an inside few of his struggle and brilliance, his gifts and tribulations. This has helped so many people throughout the years. Today, with social media and so many influences depressing and causing alienation and loneliness in our population and youth, it’s now even more important to look at what Daniel Johnston achieved, despite all obstacles, and that some of his challenges helped make him shine and bring positivity to others, worldwide.” Deborah Colton

This exhibition is the most comprehensive ever created of his work and is curated by his beloved sister who was his caretaker and art collaborator in later years, Marjory Johnston. The exhibition was created and debuted at Deborah Colton Gallery in Houston, Texas in 2024, a gallery who has been representing Daniel Johnston’s works since 2011. Last year a film series and select works were shown at Anthology Film Archives in NYC. A selection of Johnston works was also exhibited at

Parlor Gallery, Asbury Park, New Jersey in 2025.

Free and open to the public

Gallery Hours: Monday – Friday 10 – 5.

For additional Information please contact Gallery Director Scott Knauer at: 732-923-4786 or by email at: sknauer@monmouth.edu or visit Monmouth.edu/MCA

Daniel Johnston Film Screening Weekend at ANTHOLOGY FILM ARCHIVES in NYC. 

Anthology Film Archives: 32 2nd Avenue, New York, NY 10003.  212-505-5181
September 20-22, 2025

Songwriter, musician, and artist Daniel Johnston passed away in 2019, but both his music and artwork continue to attract rapturous attention. Johnston is certainly best known as a stunningly prolific songwriter, whose unique, deeply personal, vulnerable, and unapologetically lo-fi songs – most of them initially recorded and distributed on cassette tape – attracted legions of fans despite, or because of, their unpolished textures and their disarming reflections of the mental illness with which he struggled throughout his life. Celebrated both by critics and fellow musicians (most famously Kurt Cobain, but also Jad Fair, Tom Waits, Jeff Tweedy, and many others), Johnston’s music was only one manifestation of his creativity. He was an equally prolific artist, compulsively producing countless drawings that reflected – perhaps even more than his music – his singular preoccupations, highly distinctive set of characters and symbols, and his unique view of the world.

In collaboration with Johnston’s sister, Marjory Johnston, as well as gallerist Deborah M. Colton, owner of Deborah Colton Gallery and OUTPOST NYC DCG. 

Anthology Film Archives presents a weekend of screenings of some of the films and videos that have documented Johnston’s life and work, including the acclaimed documentary THE DEVIL AND DANIEL JOHNSTON (2005), the concert film THE ANGEL AND DANIEL JOHNSTON: LIVE AT THE UNION CHAPEL (2008), and a brand-new work, FLAT TIRE DOWN MEMORY LANE (2025), in which filmmaker Avalon Stevens provides a fascinating glimpse of Johnston’s artwork and the collections that he assembled and among which he lived in his home in Waller, Texas, in his final years.

Marjory Johnston, Avalon Stevens and Deborah Colton will be here in person to present the screenings.

Avalon Stevens

FLAT TIRE DOWN MEMORY LANE

2025, 60 min, digital

This newly completed work – made after Johnston’s death – constructs a highly revealing portrait of the artist via interviews with his sister, Marjory (who in his later years collaborated with Daniel on his artwork and continues to advocate for and promote his work), a special focus on his drawings, as well as documentation of his last home, a house in Waller, Texas, which he filled with a truly mind-boggling volume of books, records, VHS tapes, and other collections, all of which serve as a kind of self-portrait of a unique mind and sensibility.  Plus, additional clips and excerpts!

Sat, Sept 20 at 5:30 and Sun, Sept 21 at 7:30.

Jeff Feuerzeig

THE DEVIL AND DANIEL JOHNSTON

2005, 110 min, 35mm

This acclaimed film – made with the cooperation of Daniel Johnston – is the definitive documentary portrait of the singer-songwriter. Delving deeply and sensitively into Johnston’s extraordinary music, his equally singular and accomplished artwork, and his struggles with mental illness, it’s a profoundly revealing exploration not only of a particular artist and his work, but of the relationship that so often exists between artistic creation and psychological disturbance.

Sat, Sept 20 at 7:30 and Mon, Sept 22 at 7:30.

Antony Crofts

THE ANGEL AND DANIEL JOHNSTON: LIVE AT THE UNION CHAPEL

2008, 65 min, digital

This concert film captures one of Daniel Johnston’s greatest live performances, a July 2007 appearance at London’s Union Chapel. Joined by an impressive array of friends and admirers, including longtime collaborator Brett Hartenbach, Scottish folksinger James Yorkston, and English composer Adem, Daniel delivers definitive renditions of favorites from across his body of work.

Sun, Sept 21 at 5:30.

Daniel Johnston – I Am a Baby in My Universe

Daniel Johnston: I am a Baby In My Universe

February 17, 2024 to March 16, 2024
Deborah Colton Gallery

Houston, Texas

Daniel Johnston, at a very young age, decided that he wanted to be a comic book artist like Jack Kirby, whose work he admired. He drew constantly, which often caused his teachers to reprimand him for not paying attention. By the time he reached Junior High, his drawing skills were quite advanced… but during those years mental illness appeared in the form of depression. 

While he still dreamed of becoming a cartoonist for Marvel Comics, his drawing time became something more. It was a form of self-therapy to help him cope with his depression. It was an escape. In his early twenties his mental illness blossomed into schizophrenia. In spite of this, he continued his daily drawing, producing pieces that give the viewer a glimpse into his journey with mental illness.  He created an entire universe of his own, complete with a cast of characters caught up in the eternal battle of good and evil.  Some characters were original creations.  Others were borrowed from pop culture. 

This art exhibit, “I am a Baby in my Universe” is an introduction to the major characters (and some of the minor ones) that inhabit his imagined world. It will display nearly 200 works of art in groupings that will introduce 45 characters showing examples of art pieces in which they are featured. Daniel’s drawings have an undeniable appeal, saturated in a childlike wisdom that has won him fans and followers around the world. The show will also feature a screening room playing the documentary The Devil and Daniel Johnston (2005) as well as a display about the effects of mental illness in Dan’s art.