How I Make Comics: Part 2

Pam’s Pictorama Post: Wowza. It has been a busy few months here at Deitch Studio and since we are getting ready to hit the pause button for the summer, I thought I would do a bit of a round up on things here. As Pictorama readers probably know, as Kim’s book How I Make Comics emerged into the world, he was barely a week out from back surgery and that complicated things a might. (A post on some of that can be found here and here.) Nevertheless, we hit the ground running and book promotion continued apace and grown like topsy.

I am not sure of the difference, but somehow when Reincarnation Stories came out it seemed to be less. Kim’s last event, at Columbia University, was just a week or so before the world shut down for Covid – seriously just under the wire. There were events and reviews but somehow there just seems to be so much more this time, maybe Covid just obscures the memory of it. (Full disclosure, I just asked Kim and he remembers Reincarnation Stories as more so this is just one woman’s opinion – or I just don’t remember it all. I did of course write a very biased review of Reincarnation Stories when it came out which can be read here.)

Reincarnation Stories has also been reprinted in paperback. It’s nice to see this old friend while out on the promotion trail!

There have been three podcasts and all are available now. The first was with Amusing Jews (here) and then one with some interesting questions from Robin McConnell on Inkstuds. Robin has interviewed Kim before and this was a good discussion. His new podcast can be heard here. Most recently Harry Siegel came and taped one right here at Deitch Studio for Lit NYC. (I got to chime in for this one!) It is the longest and most in depth of the three and just went live yesterday. It can be heard here. So much for my idea of doing a podcast with just Kim and I – at best it will wait for a quieter time!

Yesterday we were in Philadelphia for a reading at Partners and Son bookstore. We hopped on the Amtrak and got in early enough to stop at a few used bookstores nearby I found online. We paused however to admire the sculpture in the station. Check out the wild relief, Spirit of Transportation, below.

Meanwhile the first shop was called Mostly Books and as Kim said, was the sort of rabbit warren of a space that you could spend hours and hours in and keep finding things. Obviously, we could only give it a superficial once over but came away with several books each. (Nothing like starting an afternoon of walking by buying some books to carry!) There was a floor and a half of bookcase after bookcase of books, dvd’s and cd’s. Prices were very good. I think if we lived there we would go frequently.

Then, after trying to follow the little blue dot on the map on my phone which tends to be a bit tedious and instead asking a local walking down the street, we found Brickbat Books. This is a lovely little store and to its credit it was full to the gills with folks. It is a mix of old and new books. We found How I Make Comics on a shelf in the back – our first sighting of it in the wild. (I took a quick pic which is up at the top of the post.) By that time, already laden with books, Kim acquired one more and signed their copy of his book at their request. (They spied his Mineshaft t-shirt and I was wearing a new Waldo one – see below and at the bottom for order link!)

Partners and Son is a lovely shop, all comics, graphic novels and related items. The proprietors, Tom Marquet and Gina Dawson, were so welcoming and organized. We dropped our bags there and went across the street to a French influenced bar-restaurant, Side Eye, for a quick bite. We immediately encountered the woman who had given us directions who asked if we’d found the store. Kim had an enormous burger and I had a polite (but very good) salad as it turned out to be a not very vegetarian friendly menu.

*The assembled group at Partners & Son.*

The crowd already had assembled when we got back to the store and it was a very nice audience. Kim read The Two Marie’s (my favorite story from the new book) and then answered questions which were many and varied, although mostly about his process.

Meanwhile, as I mentioned, I was sporting the new Waldo t-shirt which John Kelly over @dummyzine made from a new design by Kim. A rather splendid mug with the image (nice and big, the way I like ’em) and some other Kim related merchandise are available here.

So we head into summer with a strong wind behind us promotion-wise. I think we are both looking forward to summer and catching up before Kim hits it again in the fall. Meanwhile, I offer that Kim is already about one third of the way into his next book, Living the Dream!

Write Soon

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Pam’s Pictorama Post: Saturday is dawning very bright and hot again today, although it promises to be a bit better than the last few days which have felt much July than June. We shall see. There could be ice cream in my future.

We here at Deitch Studio are regrouping after a long week of work including some promotion for Kim’s, How I Make Comics. Kim taped a podcast yesterday with Harry Siegel (I even got to chime in), and that will be showing up on Lit NYC in about a week we are told. (Kim has done two others, one with Amusing Jews which can be found here and another with Robin McConnell on Inkstuds, which has not come out yet.) Next week we head to Philadelphia for Kim to do a talk at Partners and Sons bookshop and then things seem to calm down a bit as we drift to New Jersey for the summer in about a month. We will have the summer to recoup.

I try to take my part-time job as the in-house promoter for Deitch Studio seriously. Yesterday the interviewer asked if I was going to pursue doing a podcast with Kim. (I ventured some speculation on that in a post here.) I answered honestly that maybe after all the initial promotion for the book is over. Right now we are pretty deep in it without starting anything new – yikes!

*Artwork advertising for the gig next week. I love seeing a selection of my toys in this one!*

As I sit here, Kim is writing a letter to his friend Zach Sally about Zach’s book, Folrath, which he sent to Kim via a friend at MoCCA recently. Cookie is enjoying the approximately 30 minutes of sun she gets on a certain chair each morning this time of year. Blackie though is having an off morning not eating his food and I am eyeing some meds I might need to put in him to help.

The coffee is on, the smell wafting into the living room, (the end of a loaf of Orwashers excellent sourdough bread awaits us as toast) and I realize I truly digress, but it has been on one those weeks and Saturday morning finds us a bit exhausted. Fresh Direct will be dropping off some groceries soon, however other than maybe making a quick soup I would say this weekend is all about collapsing a bit and resting up.

*Orwashers last weekend. It is always so cheerful and jolly that I find myself taking pics while waiting in the line that generally goes out the door.*

Meanwhile, for the main event today (if a bit belatedly and far down in this post) I share an embossed, die-cut style cat card purchased last weekend. A scaredy cat threatens I’ll get my back up if you don’t write soon! The cat has a deep 3-D quality and highlights (you can see he even casts a small shadow), which make him stand out further on this paper which has a faux linen quality and tooth to it. He is a true miniature version of a German embossed Halloween decoration. There is no copyright or publisher’s information on the card.

On the back there is a postmark of Janesville, Wisconsin, with a June or July date I cannot read, 1908. Rather plaintively it says, Why don’t you ever write to – Lucy. And it is addressed to Mrs. M. C. Vosburg, Ft. Atkinson, Wis. R.F. D. No. 3. Poor Lucy. So I guess this card was chosen to the point here. I do hope Mrs. Vosburg wrote to Lucy eventually.

How Kim Makes Comics: a Pictorama Perspective

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Pam’s Pictorama Post: The cats are lined up and bent over sheets of Bristol Board, brushes clasped in paws, working hard with tiny pots of ink at the ready. They produce their sheets in an anthropomorphic ballet as they pass them in an assembly line, one to another. Kim keeps a weather eye on their progress while creating the art they are inking. While I, on the other hand, dance through the room in my vintage custom cat decorated dress, bringing treats and encouragement – while also the voice of reason and sometimes critique. Waldo lurks in the corners or out the window, wrecking occasional havoc. That is how folks might imagine life here at Deitch Studio.

The reality is slightly different and Kim actually gives you a pretty fair sense of it in his latest book, How I Make Comics. (It is available now. You can snatch yours up here and here online or run to your local comic bookstore and demand a copy.) Our tiny one room apartment is depicted there, although much like when they advertised apartments for sale, it somehow looks slightly bigger and some of the piles exist but I am grateful it looks a bit neater. Cookie and Blackie wander through, but he has spared you my long chatty conversations with them.

*Kim’s workspace drawn in How I Make Comics.*

*…And a recent picture taken for an interview.*

Yes! Today is the day for my spousal and admittedly very biased review of Kim’s new book, How I Make Comics. For anyone who missed my earlier also biased wifely review of Kim’s Reincarnation Stories back in 2019, it can be read here. (And a new edition of Reincarnation Stories in trade soft cover can be found for sale here or here.)

What Kim has captured, to my thrill and delight, at the core of this book – is the unending conversation which is the background of our lives, much of which is devoted to developing storylines. Sometimes these are just little spurts of story. Kim will tell me something and I’ll say, Ha, there’s a story there! and he might spin it out a bit or I will read a wild snippet from the morning New York Times aloud and wind us both up. Some stick, most don’t. (As noted in the book, those that qualify earn a place on a bit of paper on his desk under the plexiglass he draws on.) I am the only one on social media and share the occasional choice tidbit – a cat that brings a stone to a fish store daily in exchange for a treat or the like.

*I love it when Kim creates new toys amongst my real ones. Detail from page 33 of How I Make Comics.*

Meanwhile, for those of you who like to see the Pam Butler character you will not be cheated. I sit here with my coffee, in my pajamas (Pictorama folks know I wrote about my favorite pair of pj’s in elephant toile here a few years ago) at my laptop, often on a weekend morning, while Kim sits next to me (really next to me, I squeeze past him each morning – while inking no less, talk about ballet) to get more coffee. He’s working and there is a stream of consciousness discussion between us. His desk complete with photos over his workspace is lovingly depicted in several pages – recognize any of those from prior Pictorama posts?

I’m not saying that it is only in the morning that we chat extensively, but it is the most time we have together during the week when we aren’t eating dinner and exhaustedly watching our current passion on television. (While old films continue to play a major role in our watching, we have recently worked our way through a Japanese serial, Jin, from 2011, followed by the Canadian series, Anne With an E, ’17 and now just catching up with Breaking Bad, ’08. As you can see we missed the early to mid-20 teens in television and are making up for it now.) Depicted in the book is our Covid/post Covid configuration of the apartment and much of How I Make Comics has at least its genesis in those years. (There is one sole visual reference to mask wearing on pages 66 and 67 – a true passage of that story.)

It is funny for me (and somewhat enlightening) to see the comic book version of myself with my words coming out of her mouth. My role as critic and top rejector of not-quite-up-to-snuff stories is played out in this book. Pam Butler sounds a bit hard at times, although frankly I recognize precisely what she says as my very own words or ones much like them so no argument. On the other hand, how could I reject a story about a 40-year-old cat in Harlem? Although I guess I don’t really and Kim plays it out for us, telling in true rollicking Deitch style.

To step back and have a real fan girl moment, it is a just thrill to have this book in my hands. We both love its shiny, metallic cover which portrays us in a sort of grinning, gaping cartoon grin, cats flying off, Kim working hard at his table with me over this shoulder. Pages are piling up around him – that’s real too.

Last night Kim had a signing at Desert Island in Brooklyn and Gabe Fowler had thoughtfully stocked many of Kim’s earlier books and others were brought in by people for signing. It was a glorious bunch of Deitch to sort through – Beyond the Pale (my own square one first Deitch book purchase about a year before meeting him); Smilin’ Ed; even The Amazing, Enlightening and Absolutely True Adventures of Katherine Whaley (arguably Kim’s favorite book of his); even Hollywoodland, and the equally allusive Shadowland, which might be the best size and printing ever of one of Kim’s books and sold out so quickly that they are hard to find. Having said that the work is well represented in this new volume with the space needed to investigate the tiny details in the images. It was a mini-career retrospective which I pawed through with delight while he was signing.

Fantagraphics has thoughtfully brought out a great trade paper edition of Reincarnation Stories at the same time and I admit with both on the table I felt like a mom who can’t decide between her children who are both beloved. In many ways though, How I Make Comics is a logical heir to Reincarnation Stories and even has a reincarnation tale told within. I really like the physical design of the trade paper volume. Seems to me it will be a pleasure to read that way.

*Copies of the new softcover edition of Reincarnation stories showed up here the other day too!*

It is a special thrill for me to see one of my actual storylines developed in How I Make Comics, Rat-Haven. It has been given a liberal Deitchien touch, but the original bones for it were, as depicted, from me – a story that popped into my head full-blown one morning on the way to work. Meanwhile of course there are liberal amounts of performing elephants, romance, retribution, cat people and other Kim Deitch essentials teeming throughout this book. A pro tip: look at the front and especially end papers carefully and you will get a bit of a story postscript.

*A young Marie Deitch reveling in science fiction magazines.*

Lastly, I am compelled to share that my favorite story in this book is, The Two Maries. There are stories of his that I have gently rooted for Kim to tell over time, and this is one of them which I am so glad to see executed. To me it is the perfect blend of things (real and might have been) and the visuals of Kim’s mom, Marie, and her science fiction reading addiction is one of the highlights of this volume. It kicks off the sort of appendix section at the back of the book – these appendixes are sort of like the kitchen at the party where everyone turns out to be hanging out – savoring some of the best bits for last.

So that readers is my heavily biased review of Kim’s new book. A prouder wife does not exist than Mrs. Pictorama Deitch today! I say, enjoy!

MoCCA Fest

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Pam’s Pictorama Post: This is an interesting year for me to focus on MoCCA, the annual comic con manisfestation of the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art) now it its 24th year. I think Kim and I have been going to this comics fest since its early days at the Puck Building downtown. From there it bounced a bit and had homes at various locations including the Armory, Chelsea and now the Metropolitan Pavilion on West 18th Street. Sponsored by The Society of Illustrators (which probably deserves its own post covering its august history), MoCCA is an annual March event by which we tell the comics calendar here in New York City. Over time it has grown like topsy and there was a moment yesterday afternoon when I literally couldn’t move in the gathered crowd!

This year was a bit special for Deitch Studio because Kim’s new book, How I Make Comics, is being previewed there with advanced copies, a talk and signings. We are so excited to see the book at long last! So we had a bit more of a purpose there than our more usual ramblings.

*Kim and Bill kicking off the talk and Bill’s copy of Kim’s new book here.*

However, the road to it was complicated this year and in part I write because I think you’ve had some hurried Pictorama posts on recent weekends. To start at the beginning, as snow buried New York repeatedly in March Kim and I weren’t doing our morning walk to work – not surprisingly, it was lousy walking. (I wrote about those walks not long ago here.) He’d had some pain and walking seemed to aliviate it, however without it, about a month ago we realized that he was having increased pain – and, alarmingly, trouble walking at all. A trip to the ER followed three Saturdays ago, and it turns out he had a severely herniated disc.

It was clear that surgery was in the offing – eschewing actual emergency surgery, we started on the bumpy road which led us to an operation last Thursday (micro surgery – I’d only considered this on animals via work oddly enough), although some issues kept him in the jug until a week ago today. (I liked the hospital okay enough although I think our animal hospital is much nicer – I’d much rather go there!)

*This was one of those rarified items that turned up – never saw this before!*

In general surgery seems to have been a great success. He’s walking much better, improving daily, although he needs to develop some muscle for any distance again. No bending, lifting or twisting – we seem to be good about the lifting but the bending and twisting, well…he tries. Most importantly for all involved, he was back in his work chair for pretty much full days starting on Monday – he’s made his halfway through the next book already and has a full head of steam.

*Kim’s messier (even) than usual work table and area shown here – as shown at the slide show yesterday.*

All this to say, it’s been a busy time on the ground here at Deitch Studio and we were on a deadline with MoCCA kicking off the book yesterday. I’m pleased to say it was a great day and really much fun. John Kelly of Dummyzine fame (@dummyzine) invited Kim to sit at his table for part of the day, joining Bob Camp of Ren and Stimpy fame. John is working on a long interview with Kim for Dummy which we look forward to coming out later this year.

*Mark Newgarden, John and Kim looking over some of John’s rare Deitch items.*

At lunchtime our friend and comics historian Bill Kartalopoulos (@kartalopoulos) did a great interview with Kim which covered process (what fun to see one of Kim’s pages go from rough pencils to a tight lay out and then to an inked page through the miracle of Powerpoint), but also delved into some family history which plays out in How I Make Comics. He spent some time on my favorite story in the collection, The Two Maries, about Kim’s mom and grandmother hitchhiking from Denver to LA in 1939.

*A young and very pretty Marie Deitch (nee Billingsley) shown here.* *I knew her in later years and was very fond of her.*

Yours truly and Pam’s Pictorama got a shout out as well – thank you Bill! And we were so pleased to see how many folks showed up for the talk – a thank you to those of you who made it.

Then it was over to the Fantagraphics table (Kim’s longstanding publisher and a big presence at the con) to sign advanced copies of the book and meeting folks which is always fun. I get to see some early, rare appearances of Kim’s work in volumes people have collected and want him to sign. Amazing! This fan girl is thrilled!

We’re back today for more – if you are around say hello! Kim is signing from 1-2:00 today and otherwise we will spend some time back with John and his other guests. I will man the box of original art for sale so come on by – and back to more traditional Pictorama next week!

Valentine’s Day 2026

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Pam’s Pictorama Post: The sands of time have been running through that hourglass quickly again and we find ourselves at Valentine’s Day for our much beloved and long anticipated Kim Deitch Valentine reveal! For those of you who are newly initiated, Pam’s Pictorama has two major reveals annually – our holiday card which we collaborate on and the Valentine which is 100% Kim Deitch special for me!

As someone whose birthday falls right before Valentine’s Day (it was this past Wednesday and more about a very extraordinary birthday gift in another post), back in our first or second year together I asked Kim for a drawing for my very own. The earlier efforts were a bit more simple, but the project grew like topsy in subsequent years and now it is an elaborate full-on several week drawing extravaganza, and each year really does seem to top the year before. As the ultimate Kim Deitch fan (yes, it is me!) there really couldn’t be anything more exciting or a greater honor. A handful made their way to an exhibit in France years ago and it is my greatest pleasure to be depicted so lovingly in these – always surrounded by my passions of cats and vintage toys!

People always ask if it is a surprise and I have to remind them that Deitch Studio, while grand in many ways, is still one room so not much goes on here that we don’t both know about. Still, each year his vision for it and how he realizes it is always entirely different. I share some other years below.

*A cat band version from my Jazz at Lincoln Center years! Pams-Pictorama.com collection.*

*This one from 2016 has me in a similar ermine outfit with Felix dioramas! Pams-Pictorama.com collection.*

This year I am pleased as punch to be Amazing Pam and the Queen of My Heart! I wear my spiffy little ermine trimmed outfit – sort of a cross between a jacket and top you’d actually see me in and a regal regalia, even fur trimmed. (Obviously no ermines were hurt in the making of this card. Kim is threatening to retire this outfit in drawings.) The inspiration for the two cats on either side of me is the wonderful off-model Felix on a scooter toy which lives at the foot of our bed, shown below.

*My faux Felix toy! Pams-Pictorama.com collection.*

This fake Felix was made by Chien toys. The Chien toy empire was founded by Julius Chien in New York in 1903. He got his start making the Cracker Jack toys and found his way into inexpensive tin toys, mechanical and often character toys. The business peaked in the 1930’s and ’40s and in later decades (sadly) broke off into housewares. He probably also had the license on the actual Felix so I wonder how this impressive Not-Felix came to be and why. There market was flooded with them as shown in part below.

*Gunterman Felix, not in Pictorama collection.*

My version is a bit incomplete, dented on one side and I don’t believe I have ever written about him before. There is indeed an official Felix version like mine, and also the ones (a version above) that always goes incredibly high at auction with him chasing mice. I am very fond of an Italian version (below) which comes up rarely and I have tried to get but never snagged. However, I started using it as my avatar on Zoom during Covid and still do. We’ve always liked this knock-off version however, with his spiffy little jacket, polka dot vest (who doesn’t love a polka dot vest?), toothy grin, glasses and big old schnoz of a nose. While they must have used the same cut out mold as the Felix they have entirely reimagined him, arguably for the better on this occasion. He has sat at the foot of our bed for a very long time and is in my mind sort of an unofficial mascot here so I love that he is memorialized as such.

*Italian version I use as an avatar at work. I love those wheels with the stars and moon.*

While my faux Felix is actually quite flat, Kim has given him some frontal dimension imagined on one side of me. Meanwhile, with Cookie and Blackie in special places of black cat pride, I am in this card (and for the first time in a Valentine) acknowledged as the Guardian of 7 Cats. (I just typed 8 by accident – maybe a sign? Did I mention a close call with kittens on my birthday? Some at work, looking for homes – close call.) The Jersey Five are illustrated and named below starting with Beau (another black cat) followed by Stormy, Gus, Peaches (the meanest cat ever – read about her here) and Milty – our senior citizen cat. (You can read about him here.)

*Vintage Valentine I gave Kim this year.*

This drawing is largely just wild color and fun design that draws you in – like it can hardly contain itself! It is Kim at his best in that way I think and I am so pleased to have been the inspiration for it.

In the Mood for Love?

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: I have a Pre-Valentine’s Day post today to get us all in the high mystic mood for next week – when I will have a super great Deitch Valentine reveal this year. I don’t think I am spoiling the surprise when I say it is the height of hotsy totsy this year.

I admit to having accidentally left Kim to open his Valentine’s Day gift which arrived early last week! It was an early hardcover edition of a book called Lefty of the Big League by Burt L. Standish of the Merriwell book fame. I saw it in a Flat Lay Friday group photo of objects for sale on Instagram and grabbed it up on a whim for Valentine’s Day. Kim is a Merriwell fan and miraculously it seems he has not read this other book by Standish. I was performing well until I handed him the package to open! Alas, timing is everything but the love and the thought were there nonetheless.

Meanwhile, today’s card, purchased back in the fall, is wonderful and wild. This woman is a “spider” who has cast her love net and scored this man who is now quite literally her puppet! He looks to be a well-heeled sort of the day, a watch chain stretching across pronounced ample girth, top hat, glasses rather than monocle although they sit atop his head in a jaunty fashion. He wears a print waistcoat, bow tie and jacket with some sort of other print on his fat legs ending in tiny, shiny shoes.

This fellow is smiling and I might point out that he also has a bottle of champagne in one hand and a full glass in the other – if the strings that bind him are obvious, may I say he does not appear to mind in the least.

The hand-colored beauty who is the woman-in-charge sports a green top, trimmed in red hearts (!) and stripes that really make this card for me. (Can I just say, oh to find such an item at a vintage sale and snatch it up!) A slight blush is added to her cheeks, skin and her curly hair which is highlighted brown – all adding to her winsome appeal and, shall we say, allure.

Our manipulating maiden emerges from this spider’s web (tiny tear to her left so maybe it isn’t the first rodeo for this photo set) with fat cloth hearts pinned on in a circle around her. Aside from the green label of his champagne bottle (borrowed from her shirt) and a bit in the top of his champagne glass, our puppet man is left in black and white, aforementioned strings top and bottom quite visible.

I can only really confirm that this card was sent in 1907 – there are three cancellations, two overlapping and European and I cannot verify the month or day although it might be August. This card (which the internet attributes to being Russian maker – again the cancellations make it a bit hard to see) was sent to a Mademoiselle L. Guilloim… on the Avenue de la Gare, Vielsalm, Luxembourg.

Thanks to several readers I now know I can put the image of the note into Google and get a (very) rough translation:

It is a pleasure, my dear,
for the good wishes you sent me. Like a verse, I thank you for it, and I think of it often. For short nights, I will be accused afterwards. I slept very well, a big thank you that the present during your trip? Please reply. Best regards to all your team.

Maria

Sort of interesting to chose such an extraordinary card with no mention of the image, but it seems Maria had other things on her mind.

Whoever Mademoiselle G. was, I am very glad she saw fit to keep this card in fairly pristine condition for me to share with you today and wishing you a romantic week leading up to next Saturday.

Quarter

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Pam’s Pictorama Post: I believe I recently mentioned in passing that most days Kim walks to work with me. This started after a nice summer of a lot of walking and the desire to keep the good habit up. My morning walk is from 86th Street to 62nd, right down First Avenue or York. Often I walk home as well, weather permitting, but it is rare that I don’t walk in the morning as the subway is too far and the bus down York is slow and crowded. It’s something between 4-5 miles roundtrip.

Kim walks to about 68th Street before turning back to get on with his day working in the apartment. I finish the walk and end with a stop at a deli on 62nd`where I generally get a breakfast sandwich and fill a small thermos (glorified travel cup – I wrote about it last week here) with coffee. The bodega is called Space Market and at first I wondered what was always turning up on my credit card bill that way. I talked to a friend who worked in the area decades ago and it turns out that Space has been there a long time. It is neat and clean and they play rather remarkable jazz – not the early music I prefer but still, some very interesting and good contemporary jazz. It is some sort of list or play loop but very long before I ever heard it repeat. Someone knowledgeable person has put it together very lovingly.

In the beginning while I was finding my rhythm I experimented with buying lunch there but really a sandwich was too expensive. Eventually I shifted to bringing leftovers for lunch, never having found an affordable option in the neighborhood. However, their perch less than a block from my office makes it my go to for breakfast – and I am not alone, I see much of the hospital staff there. I have a regular order (one egg over medium on a toasted English muffin) and now all I need to do is nod at the grill guy and he gets it ready.

Well-meant but also unfortunate other portraits from the series.

The woman behind the register changes periodically. For a long time there was an extremely cheerful young woman who asked about my jewelry and chatted about all sorts of things. I was sad to see her go. They have had trouble replacing her and recently I got the wrong sandwich (scrambled eggs on an everything bagel with hot sauce!) and on another day a batch of coffee which was undrinkable. I am a creature of habit but I’ve started eyeing other establishments if they can’t pull up their socks a bit.

Most days Kim and I are chatted about the day ahead, the story he is working on or the meetings I have, or something else entirely like a television show he watched as a kid or how some dogs greet each other on the sidewalk. (New York City has a lot of dog on the street activity and since I took this job my dog awareness has been heightened.) Sometimes though we are both mulling the day ahead to ourselves and yesterday was more one of those.

Kim is the one who usually stops to pick coins or more often interesting bits of metal off the street. He has a large (and it seems still growing) collection of metal washers, organized by size and thickness, which lives in our bathroom for some reason. Most often though it is interesting heavy screws or metal bits, copper is a bonus, and this practice is hell on his pockets. However yesterday it was I who happened to have eyes on the ground and spotted a shiny bit.

I stopped in my tracks (always a bit dangerous to stop short on a busy sidewalk here) and picked it up. I was rewarded with a rather mint looking Anna May Wong quarter! Kim and I have been very curious about these since their issue in 2022 and have yet to run across one. While the design seems a bit unsatisfactory (unflattering) the concept carries it. It would appear, depending on the particulars of your quarter and condition, that it is valued at something between 30 cents and $1000 – although on the higher end I would say asking is not getting. (Nor does ours display any visible printing malfunctions that would increase its value.)

As most Pictorama readers probably know, the actress. Born on January 3, 1905 she rose to fame in silent film as a rare Asian American leading lady. While her early films like Toll of the Sea (1922, it can be found here) allowed her to make her way into film, it was the later many sound films from the 1930’s with titles like Dangerous to Know (’38)and Island of Lost Men (’39) that she is best remembered for. Recently Kim and I had a chance to see a little available German silent, Großstadtschmetterling or Pavement Butterfly (’29), with English subtitles and her true range as an actress is on display. Sadly it is only available online in German at the time of writing this. As per a Wikipedia synopsis: A Chinese dancer in the nightclubs of Paris, becomes involved with a Russian painter and becomes his model. She is persecuted by a man named Coco, accused of theft. Later, in the French Riviera she is at last able to prove her innocence. Don’t miss it if you have a chance to see it.

*Another still of Anna May Wong from Pavement Butterfly.*

The Anna May Wong quarter, a part of a series honoring American women of note, was the final release on October 25, 2022. Others honored included Dr. Sally Ride (first woman in space) and Maya Angelou in somewhat equally unflattering portraits. Years ago there was a series of quarters which did a tribute to each state and the art was far superior. I often stopped to admire one and I kept Vermont and Tennessee for a long time I liked them so much. Not all, but some, were like little works of art.

*I remembered Vermont as a cabin but I do remember this. Can’t find the cabin imagery I remember though!*

So it is more in tribute to Anna May Wong and her skill as an actress that this find enters the Pictorama collection today and we consider it a bit of a find.

Still Young

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Post: The year is still young enough flash this New Year card, found in the pile on my desk back here in our New York HQ at Deitch Studio. We made the trek back, cats tucked unhappily in their carriers, a few days ago, this past Wednesday. A food delivery (love ya Fresh Direct) will arrive in a bit. After spending the morning with you all here at Pictorama, I will finish unpacking us, break down a bunch of boxes that we moved art supplies and food in, and life will slowly resume its Manhattan manifestation until the summer when the whole crew will decamp again. I will of course be in New Jersey periodically looking in on the Jersey Five (cats) and continuing my efforts to convert Peaches to a pet-able house cat.

Like almost everyone around me, I have started the New Year with a bad cold which is hanging on tenaciously. Meanwhile, Blackie seems a bit morose which leaves us scratching our heads – we know he doesn’t miss the other cats there. Was his spot on a chair in the sun that nice? Or under another chair and near a heat vent? He’s eating but carrying an expression of world weariness. He hisses at Cookie as if he never met her before – something he does when we return to the apartment.

Okay, onto the postcard! I don’t know how I missed this brilliant card when piling up ones for New Jersey, but I did and I cannot wait a whole year to share it. This one has weirdly wonderful all over it. It wasn’t cheap but it was among some items I considered a bit of a bargain when purchased last fall.

I am a longstanding sucker for a good moon face and this one certainly qualifies; I could not ask for better. What really kills me is the weird little skirt-wearing body they have attached it too. (Is the moon a woman?) Weird nebulous feet on sort of fat baby-esque legs and the amorphous body is finished off with hands that look like they belong to yet something else. That moon head just floats though and is more substantial so at first you don’t put it together with the body, but then you do and chuckle!

The cheeky cherubs, in the arms of the moon, have a champagne bottle, held by one while the other toasts (or is it offering the glass to the moon?) with a glass full of bubbly. Dark clouds fill an even darker blue green sky behind them. Because it is dark it is hard to see but this card is lightly embossed, the cherubs in the highest relief but the clouds are gently shaped too, the moon’s dress also in low relief giving it texture. It wishes us A Happy New Year at the bottom in an Arts and Crafts writing so decorative it takes a minute to read it.

*Back of card – what is the aunt’s name?*

This card is postmarked on December 30, 1907, from somewhere in Pennsylvania; the town is illegible. To the best of my ability to read the brown ink script it says: Hello! Auntie: – How you feeling by this time red’d your letter this morning am very glad your roommate studys [sic] harmony once in a while. Your niece Ethel. It is address to Miss Grace Mangst, Warrin. Ohio D.M.J. No maker mark is in evidence on the card – which is too bad because these folks had something going on. I don’t usually hang seasonal cards but this one’s a gem.

Of course the big 2026 news here at Deitch Studio is Kim’s book, How I Make Comics is coming out in April. It is on pre-order – find it here. We find ourselves already deeply immersed in how to help launch this book. In the service of promoting it, I am toying with doing a podcast where Kim and I will talk about the origins of the stories and his history in comics. As I have previously with other intimidating projects (I know nothing about recording and editing), I share this with you all to help keep me honest about working on it. However, I am also asking you to weigh in on the idea. Is it a good one? Will folks listen? Or should I keep to my tip tap typing? Please weigh in below or leave a comment.

A New Year

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Post: This year the New Year brought a lousy head cold which I am only just recovering from. It was fairly well timed for a day or so of laying around and reading which arguably is what I should have been doing under any circumstances. The novels are largely not worth mentioning – a rom com about a woman who finds she is dating an android (I thought it had more possibilities than it delivered) and Buckeye which seems to be everyone’s novel of the moment – deservedly. It is very good and fair to say it is sort of an instant classic. (Sadly I am still looking for my next Rosa Mulholland fix. Prior posts about those books can be found here and here. I have read a few since then and owe you all an update.)

Cold notwithstanding this has been a nice holiday visit to NJ. Cookie has made progress and now comes down the stairs to look at first floor activity. She sits in a chair in Kim’s studio like a little queen, much better adjusted to her NJ surroundings than she used to be.

Peaches, we have an ongoing dialogue these days about trying to be a better kitty.

Peaches, our very asocial girl – aka the meanest cat in the world – is make surprising progress in her relation to humans and other cats. I have tried having long conversations with her about this and she listens carefully. She now is willing to sit on a towel near my chair even if I cannot actually pet her. (She’s also showed us how, when atop another chair, she chases her tail in a frenzy – and she has tried, less successfully, to steal food from her very large sibling, Beau. I have written Peaches story here if you want to read it.)

*Kim’s page – hot off the press, or perhaps still on it!*

Shown above, Kim is working on a spectacular pencil for his next story. It speaks for itself! (Check out that polar bear! And the snow!) He is making good use of his time here.

We’ve paid a visit to the comic book store and, obviously given yesterday’s post, to the Red Bank Antique Annex. I also purchased this very nice camel (in photo at the top and which is part of a Christmas set – I will likely keep him in my cabinet year round however) and a nice Santa shown here too. Red Bank was pleasantly decked out in small town holiday mode with lights – although you also get to see Macy’s just before the holiday, snapped on my way to the train on one of the days I commuted into the city.

*Macy’s during my commute in right before Christmas.*

Kim and I had a cozy lunch that day at a favorite place I have written about before, Dublin House. This is an old Victorian house which has been converted to a restaurant and bar. Originally built in neighboring Middletown, it was moved across the river to Red Bank back in 1840. It was first rehabilitated back in 1971 as a ice cream parlour and restaurant. The current owners purchased it in 2004 and turned it into a rather authentic Irish enclave. (Kim and I can vouch for the “Irish nachos” which are cheesy greatness on homemade chips – yum!) There is a fireplace in the small dining room which makes it perfect for a frosty day. In the summer, door-sized windows open to outside dining on a porch and outside area. Some original details remain such as the windows shown here.

*Interior of Dublin House earlier last week.*

As I write there is a huge cat dust up in Kim’s studio – Blackie skulking up the stairs to give his sister Cookie a hard time. Kim is being referee but maybe some extra food might make Blackie less adventurous.

*View from the car driving to the train one morning in darkness with Red Bank’s twinkle lights.*

We had enough snow during this visit that I shoveled the walk and driveway twice, but was sick and skipped the most recent dusting. Luckily snow melt from a prior shoveling was still doing its job. It is a snowy winter compared to last year when we didn’t have any to memory.

*Christmas display at the Antique Annex.*

Kim and I had a little project of hanging some things up. You might remember these from prior posts – they have made their way here for permanent relocation. I also have the great Louis Wain sheet that I purchased and framed a few months ago. Heavy as it is, I am waiting for help to put that up. However, in addition to yesterday’s pig painting, we hung an interesting black cat piece from England and several photos that I purchased here for the house. The house is slowly acquiring a more distinctive Pictorama appearance.

So, well enough to make a grocery run today, I am going to leave off and go get dressed. We leave in the middle of the week so it will be an NYC post the next time you hear from me!

Deitch Studio: Christmas 2025

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Post: Arguably the most popular day on the Pictorama calendar – the holiday card reveal – and here we are again! For the third year now, with Kim’s blessing, I have attempted all seven cats – the Jersey Five and the New York cats combined as the illustration. As has become our pattern, I draw it and he then redraws, traces and inks it. The cats have stayed true to my drawing as has the design. Us in the sleigh is more him and the moon has become a good old Deitchian moon. I think it is a fair melding hybrid of our styles.

Kim noted that the cats look a bit like balloons here – of the Thanksgiving parade kind. Some more than others – Stormy hovering over Christmas is the most balloon like. (She is a pretty dreamy kitty. One of the last of the strays mom acquired.) Evidently a slow moving sleigh now that I reflect on it.

For the record and the curious, the top row from left to right are Blackie, Milty, Gus, Cookie and bottom row, Beau, Peaches and Stormy. Milty is the oldest and Peaches and Stormy roughly tie for youngest and last into the house. Cookie and Blackie are the only ones from the same litter (our New York kits) and Blackie and Beau share their all black cat-ness.

As I do the card reveal this year I need to apologize a bit – it seems I have lost my address book which I have had since college. Although many addresses have migrated to my electronic book, many of the oldest ones have not and among those I don’t necessarily have emails or numbers to text either. Someone pointed out that the universe was trying to tell me something.

I didn’t see it at first but someone pointed out that Kim has candy cane horns – I must ask him if it was on purpose or if he was having subliminal Grampus urges. Now I don’t know how I missed it.

If you are new to the card reveal, this joint card project goes back to the first year Kim and I started dating (predating Pictorama by decades) and has developed over time. Some earlier examples can be found here, here and here.

As you read this on Sunday morning we will (hopefully) be packed up and on our way to New Jersey with Cookie and Blackie in tow. We spent today (Saturday) organizing and filling boxes and suitcases so the cats are suspicious – sleeping on the bed with one eye slightly open I’d say.

When we get to the house I am anxious to see if my holiday swags of evergreens have lasted on the front railings. I will take out my few holiday decorations – oversized colored lights will go in the fireplace, an elderly Santa made of lead skiing and a few other choice bits that will live on the mantle – one of the few cat free spaces in the house. (That of course is always subject to change if a cat is enterprising enough!)

*Hard to read beyond Mr. and Mrs. Will Claff. How on earth did this get delivered I wonder.*

I thought I would bookend this post with another card I bought this fall. Sent on December 23, 1914. It was sent from Brockport, NY but the address is hard to read as is the message. Of course it was the idea of the nifty cat pull toy on the front that did it for me, bow and all. I like the little poem too which says, I send this kissy kat because I cannot go like Santa Claus, to give my Christmas love to you, or kiss you – as I’d like to do. So a Merry Christmas to you all – a few New Year’s cards tucked away next.