We ran into Collins while he was making his annual appearance at the NoCo Hemp Expo in Aurora on March 24, spreading smiles with his cannabis-themed caricatures. He's been invited back every year since the first Expo in 2014, but his love for art and hemp started budding long before that.
Westword: Being that your work is largely based on the 4/20 side of cannabis, what brings you to a hemp expo?
Matt Collins: Every year, I’ve had the opportunity to come and be the caricature artist, and I’ve been provided [hemp-based] paper by the Colorado Hemp Company in Loveland. Lizzy Knight and Morris Beegle provide this delicious, incredibly wonderful paper; if you're an artist and you feel the texture of this stuff, you can appreciate the volume. It's really wonderful paper. I enjoy doing my artwork on not just sustainable and strong paper, but also something that's really fun to draw on. When you draw with pastels on [hemp paper], it's got just a bit of oil to it, so it reacts to the medium, and it's really fun to draw on.
As a plant, hemp is the most sustainable, uses less water, doesn’t require pesticides…so that’s why we’re all here — to promote what used to be the most profitable plant on the planet. As a matter of fact, the French word for canvas comes from the word "cannabis," because all of the canvases that were on the stagecoaches coming through the West and all of the canvases that people painted on were made of hemp. It was all hemp-based, so you’ve got so many uses for it, from hemp-based cosmetics to paint to biofuels to paper.
Do you use cannabis yourself?
As a plant, hemp is the most sustainable, uses less water, doesn’t require pesticides…so that’s why we’re all here — to promote what used to be the most profitable plant on the planet. As a matter of fact, the French word for canvas comes from the word "cannabis," because all of the canvases that were on the stagecoaches coming through the West and all of the canvases that people painted on were made of hemp. It was all hemp-based, so you’ve got so many uses for it, from hemp-based cosmetics to paint to biofuels to paper.
Do you use cannabis yourself?
I’m a mild user. I used to be a heavy user when I was a kid, back when it was not so serious. I was smoking resin all day, straining bongs, seeds and stems, everything. Nowadays I’m a lot more mild. I find that if I don’t do it [often], I get a much stronger effect from it. So I very rarely do it, and when I do, I enjoy the hell out of it!
Tell us about the Mile High Misfit characters you draw. How many are there in total? Are they inspired by real people?
I have 175 different characters. After I started doing the first thirty or so, I had many people asking me if I’d make them into a Mile High Misfit. So I started turning friends of mine and people who would ask into Mile High Misfits. For example, Toking Tim is from Fort Collins, and my buddy Ray was renamed into Billy Budtrimmer. Most of the people who want to be Mile High Misfits are people who use cannabis products. There are maybe ten or more characters that I personally know in a card deck. It’s a lot of fun.
What games can be played with your "Toker" playing cards?
There are three card games, and each of the decks have wild cards in them. Most of the cards have a Colorado logo hidden somewhere within the caricature artwork, but not super obviously, so you have to kind of pay attention. It’s difficult to see, but in some of these cards, there are no Colorado logos, and those are the wild cards. By creating eleven wild cards in a deck, you can create games that utilize that [wild card] feature.
The first game is called Stoney Road, and it’s where you lay six cards face down. Starting on the left side, you grab the first card and try to find a Colorado logo. If you find one, then you can proceed to the next card, and so forth. If you don’t find a Colorado logo, then you must toke.
The second game is called Denver Lo-Hi. It’s played like War, where you split the deck, and if you lose three hands straight, then you have to toke — unless the card you're beat with was a wild card. In that case, the player may pass or choose to toke. The last game is Too High, where you have one card face up and one card face down. [For example], if the card face-up is a 2, then you have to guess if the other card will be higher or lower. If you guess correctly, then you’re okay — unless there’s no Colorado logo; then you would have to toke.
The first game is called Stoney Road, and it’s where you lay six cards face down. Starting on the left side, you grab the first card and try to find a Colorado logo. If you find one, then you can proceed to the next card, and so forth. If you don’t find a Colorado logo, then you must toke.
The second game is called Denver Lo-Hi. It’s played like War, where you split the deck, and if you lose three hands straight, then you have to toke — unless the card you're beat with was a wild card. In that case, the player may pass or choose to toke. The last game is Too High, where you have one card face up and one card face down. [For example], if the card face-up is a 2, then you have to guess if the other card will be higher or lower. If you guess correctly, then you’re okay — unless there’s no Colorado logo; then you would have to toke.
What is the process for creating these caricatures? What characteristics do you look for when putting a person on paper?
Each of these characters are a really strong distortion, so there aren’t many similarities besides the first name. When you want me to make you a Mile High Misfit, it’ll have a few similarities, but I very much distort the image in order to create a more hysterical, funny-looking person. The funnier the image, the funnier it is for me, and people seem to like that the most. If they say, "Oh, that’s disturbing!" I’m like, "Hey, that’s just what I do!"
Each of these characters are a really strong distortion, so there aren’t many similarities besides the first name. When you want me to make you a Mile High Misfit, it’ll have a few similarities, but I very much distort the image in order to create a more hysterical, funny-looking person. The funnier the image, the funnier it is for me, and people seem to like that the most. If they say, "Oh, that’s disturbing!" I’m like, "Hey, that’s just what I do!"
What other art forms you have mastered?
I do a lot of oil painting. My house is covered in oil paintings that aren’t cannabis-related. Some of my paintings have occupied my wall for so long that they start out as a profile of someone, then I start adding more characters, words and other features on it, and they become different images over time. We painted from live models back when I was in school, but I like to use the internet now. A problem that we had back then was finding references, so we had to go through magazines. Now the internet has tons of examples of people modeling in different poses that I can turn into my own artwork. But if it’s a Mile High Misfit, they’re not going to look very normal.
Etch A Sketch is the most interesting thing I do, by far. Around the world, no one knows about them, but it's a popular toy in America. What I do is I go online or on TikTok and draw whatever people request. It probably takes around fifteen minutes for me to draw something, Back in high school, I was in the smoking area since I was a stoner, and this kid came out with an Etch A Sketch. I started to draw a circle on it. Next thing you know, I realized I had this ability and would try to draw eyeballs, dragons and whatnot on them. I got better with practice, but at first it was just a party trick. Back in 2009, I realized you could cut the backs out of [Etch A Sketches], remove all of the powder, and whatever you drew would then become permanent. I drew Todd Helton, Troy Tulowitzki and [other] Rockies players for some hardwood guys I was selling to at the time. It’s an odd but interesting art form.
Etch A Sketch is the most interesting thing I do, by far. Around the world, no one knows about them, but it's a popular toy in America. What I do is I go online or on TikTok and draw whatever people request. It probably takes around fifteen minutes for me to draw something, Back in high school, I was in the smoking area since I was a stoner, and this kid came out with an Etch A Sketch. I started to draw a circle on it. Next thing you know, I realized I had this ability and would try to draw eyeballs, dragons and whatnot on them. I got better with practice, but at first it was just a party trick. Back in 2009, I realized you could cut the backs out of [Etch A Sketches], remove all of the powder, and whatever you drew would then become permanent. I drew Todd Helton, Troy Tulowitzki and [other] Rockies players for some hardwood guys I was selling to at the time. It’s an odd but interesting art form.
What are some of your goals for the business in the future?
I have no plans other than to be happy. I’ve learned from life and have seen so many of my friends die who have worked hard to become rich that I really am just happy being happy. There’s a story that I came across about a fisherman: He went out to fish on his boat, caught a few fish, and when he got to the shore, there was an MBA from Yale sitting there and relaxing on vacation. He saw the fisherman pull up and said, "Is that all you caught? What are you going to do now?" The fisherman replies, "I’m going to go home, have a little siesta with my wife, play with the kids and go off to play guitar with my friends." The MBA says, "Why don’t you catch more fish, buy another boat, start a fish market, hire people, buy a fleet and THEN go home to spend time with your wife, kids and friends?" The fisherman says, "Yeah, I’m going to skip all of that to get straight to the happy part."
That’s me. That’s my philosophy. I’m lucky I can do what I do. Now I’m living in north Denver, and I have a wonderful girl who hasn’t thrown me out for being an artist, because I don’t make a lot of money. But I make a lot of happiness.
That’s me. That’s my philosophy. I’m lucky I can do what I do. Now I’m living in north Denver, and I have a wonderful girl who hasn’t thrown me out for being an artist, because I don’t make a lot of money. But I make a lot of happiness.
