Jim Riswold Is a Role Model
By Karl Lieberman on Aug 15, 2024
Wieden+Kennedy's Karl Lieberman reflects on the Hall of Famer's iconic career
The advertising world felt a tremendous loss with the recent passing of Jim Riswold, the Wieden+Kennedy icon and Creative Hall of Fame laureate who teamed Michael Jordan with Bugs Bunny, and, well, the Führer with leukemia.
In honor of Jim’s legacy, we’ve turned our column over to W+K Global Chief Creative Officer Karl Lieberman to eulogize one of the most talented, funniest, considerate, far out-thinking creatives our kooky little industry has ever known.
“Just because I dunk a basketball, doesn’t mean I should raise your kids.”
Jim Riswold wrote that for Charles Barkley in 1993.
It was typical Riswold in that it had a clear point of view, it was blunt, it was a pretty shocking statement at the time and—above all—it was just simply the truth.
A truth 99% of brands would never talk about.
Because Jim wasn’t just making another ad about basketball or about a shoe company.
He was tapping into real things that were happening out in the real world.
I was a Sixers fan at the time (and I still am, unfortunately) and in 1993 I was surrounded by all the media and sports radio chatter about how Barkley wasn’t setting a good example for the kids because he was getting into fights, throwing a guy through a bar window and saying real and provocative things in interviews vs. just saying the typical pro-athlete cliches and sports idioms about how they “left it all on the field” or whatever.
Instead, Barkley was 100% authentic and unfabricated.
And that’s exactly what made him so interesting.
He said the things no one else was willing to say, he broke media norms and he spoke the truth.
And those were the very same things that made Riswold so interesting and compelling.
Dan Wieden once said Riswold “wrote like a god for Nike.”
David Kennedy once said, “He's one of the few writers I've worked with who basically gets a complete concept in his brain. He's got it all figured out. So being Jim's art director is like...'might as well take a nap.'”
If it’s something iconic for Nike from the first couple decades of Wieden, Riswold either wrote it, creative directed it, ECD’d it, or he mentored the person who wrote, creative directed, or ECD’d it.
Jim battled all kinds of cancer including leukemia for a couple of decades, but he never seemed to let that get in the way of things.
Despite a cynical and healthy perspective on this business we’re in, Riswold always maintained that “you can have some fun and make some money” in advertising and did so with a ton of incredible work for Nike and a lot of other clients.
Now when it came to the workplace, Jim seemed to lean a little too frequently and a little too hard into the Tom Wolfe perspective that “you’re nobody until somebody hates you.”
But despite oftentimes presenting himself as an asshole (and seemingly relishing in that), he had a huge heart that he opened to anyone. If you wanted help or advice or wisdom, he’d always be happy to give it to you. And then give you too much.
“If you wanted help or advice or wisdom, he’d always be happy to give it to you. And then give you too much.”
Jim wasn’t a role model in all things—and he would have absolutely hated the title of this piece BTW—but he was always a role model for how to get to great, truthful, real work with a clear point of view and surprising and interesting perspectives.
When we brought Jim back to Wieden a few years ago to help out, to mentor, and to bring some OG knowledge back to the place, he said, “Congratulations and I’m looking forward to you firing me someday.”
This is the first thing that made Riswold such a great role model:
DON’T TAKE ADVERTISING TOO SERIOUSLY
While he didn’t take advertising seriously, he took the work seriously.
Sort of. He was kicked off Nike seven times.
“He somehow maintained both ‘this is the work of our fucking lives’ and ‘it's just fucking advertising’ at the same time,” said Caleb Jensen, a former WK12 student and now the global CCO of our Nike business.
Jim was always putting advertising in its rightful place. He despised award shows and award publications (“Unless they were talking about him,” as his daughter Hallie pointed out to me).
He was always taking the piss out of this business. Always trying to find ways to mess with it, subvert it, and turn the whole thing upside down.
Ian Riechenthal (W+K 1998-2000, 2011-14) worked under Jim on Nike. He and his partner at the time, Scott Vitrone (W+K 1998-2000, 2011-2014) did the infamous Nike “Chainsaw” commercial for the 2000 Olympics featuring distance runner Suzy Favor Hamilton successfully running away from a chainsaw-wielding, hockey mask-wearing (Jason from Friday-the-13th-inspired) maniac with the message, “Why sport? Because you’ll live longer.”
The commercial was great. And it got pulled after NBC’s switchboard lit up with angry calls about it.
Ian tells the story of working for Riswold and in particular his “STUPID stamp”:
“If he didn’t like an idea, he’d stamp it with the STUPID stamp. But the STUPID stamp wasn’t just sitting there on his desk. He’d make a whole production out of going to get it, and the whole time you knew what was coming. First he’d stand up from his chair and do an exaggerated stretch. Then he’d say something like, ‘Pardon me, won’t you? I must get something from my shelf.’ Then he’d take his time strolling over to the shelf where he kept the STUPID stamp, pretending to not be sure exactly where it was before ‘finding’ it. Then he’d walk back to his desk with the STUPID stamp and stamp pad and slowly sit back down. And when he opened the stamp pad, he’d tap the STUPID stamp on it way more times than necessary, making sure there was plennnnnnnnty of ink on it. Only then would he actually stamp STUPID on your work. But by that time you were laughing so much that you almost didn’t realize that your work just got murdered.”
“...the STUPID stamp wasn’t just sitting there on his desk. He’d make a whole production out of going to get it, and the whole time you knew what was coming... you were laughing so much that you almost didn’t realize that your work just got murdered.”
Riswold never treated advertising as this esteemed, worthy thing.
It was all kind of a big joke, which I always found interesting because Dan Wieden would often say that Wieden+Kennedy itself was some kind of “cosmic joke.”
So maybe Jim was just leaning all the way into that.
Jim also always leaned all the way into whatever needed to be done.
He was always up for anything.
WORK HARD + HAVE AN IDEA FOR EVERYTHING
Over the years I’ve realized, at Wieden at least, that:
More ideas = more authority.
This place is not about where people sit on the org chart or who reports to who, but it’s about who has the best idea or who has the most ideas.
And Jim typically had both.
And what was crazy about Jim was he had ideas for everything.
An anecdote from Blair Warren – W+K global CCO for Nike:
“When we reached out to him about making a Tiger farewell message a few months ago… we sent him an email, simply asking if he’d help us work on the project. He emailed us back maybe two minutes later. His email didn’t contain any questions about timing, or deliverables or budget. He just wrote one single sentence:
‘It was a hell of a round, Tiger.’
That was it. And he never even followed up to hear if clients bought it.”
(They did BTW)
Jim always made it clear that as a CD you had to not only be up for everything thrown W+K’s way, but you’d also be willing to do the whole entire project if no one else wanted to. Or if no one else could.
Because a good CD’s job should never be to just give a thumbs up or a thumbs down to things at the end of the process – anyone right off the street could do that job.
Instead, a good CD’s job is to constantly feed the place with ideas and thinking and perspective throughout the entire creative process.
That way, if someone beats what the CDs got with their better idea, awesome. If they don’t, then the CDs got it covered. Everyone’s safe and thus the creatives are free to really reach and experiment with their thinking. The creatives are free to fail too, because their boss is in the back of the room with something in their back pocket in the event it’s needed.
“Jim always made it clear that as a CD you had to not only be up for everything thrown W+K’s way, but you’d also be willing to do the whole entire project if no one else wanted to. Or if no one else could.”
Jim just loved coming up with ideas. He loved to work. Shaine Edwards – W+K creative and former WK12 student – said, “A lot of writers have to force themselves to work. Jim got up early because he couldn't wait to write. You can really see it in his personal work, as his agency emails and artist statements grew to thousands of words. The feeling you get when you manage to surprise yourself in your work is something Jim lived for, and he pursued it every time he sat in front of a keyboard.”
Being prolific was important to Jim.
And more than anyone, he knew how to unlock that, which was by making the work extremely personal.
HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY—MAKE IT PERSONAL
Jim knew the whole trick to being prolific is to entertain yourself while creating something for somebody else.
Or as he would often put it, “Satisfy your friend. Ignore everyone else.”
Caleb Jensen has said, “Riswold always kept it personal. Everything he loved informed everything he made. And that gave everyone permission to do the same. The experiences you've had and the things you care about can be your guide. If you love it, someone else will too. When we talk about finding your voice, he's the Rosetta stone.”
Jim’s love of Lou Reed, Bugs Bunny, David Bowie, Warhol, Spike Lee’s Mars Blackmon, and more all found its way into the work. While those things may seem specific and particular—especially when you’re trying to sell some shoes—there’s a great line from the writer and poet James Joyce:
“In the particular is contained the universal.”
The last thing the world needs is another ad.
But what the world does need is more people being able to share their points of view and their perspectives on the particular things they love—even if they’re Marvin the Martian.
One important distinction to make is that Jim didn’t always impose his personal loves and interests on others. He also found ways to give others the space to bring their own interests into the work.
The outpouring from folks like Spike Lee and David Fincher and Joe Pytka alongside an absolute ton of creatives since Riswold left us show just how good he was at also allowing others to make their parts of the work as personal as he made his.
“...Jim didn’t always impose his personal loves and interests on others. He also found ways to give others the space to bring their own interests into the work.”
IN CLOSING
At the end of the day, in life, Jim Riswold was a complicated but incredible human being.
Per Hal Curtis, the longtime W+K head creative of Nike and one of Jim’s art-director partners:
“Jim was a writer's writer and a bona fide conceptual genius. And those are his words, not mine.”
Funny. And true.
Because what Jim Riswold always cared about more than anything was the work itself, and for that he showed up the same way over and over and over again: working hard and being up for anything, having a strong point of view and making it personal, and never, ever, ever taking any of it too seriously.
Riswold could be a huge pain in the ass. A smart, insane, funny, ridiculous, culture-obsessed, history-obsessed, music-obsessed, vodka-on-the-rocks-with-a-twist-of-lemon-loving wonderful pain in the ass.
And that’s because he cared so much and because he put himself fully into absolutely everything he did.
And that is why he’s the best creative this business-that-he-didn’t-take-very seriously ever saw.
W+K Nike Creative Director Jordan Dinwiddie put it best:
“Rest in peace. To the meanest. Kindest. Smartest. Dopiest. Most talented man I ever met. Thank you for pouring into me and so many others.”
Jim Riswold is a role model.
And if he were still with us, I’m positive that he’d hate that idea and would be looking around for his STUPID stamp right about now.
Karl Lieberman is the global chief creative officer of Wieden+Kennedy.
JIM RISWOLD'S CREATIVE HALL OF FAME PAGE
Related
