Not Until the Show Ends: A Tribute to Dirk Zimmer
by Arlene Wege

On September 26, just days before his 65th birthday, Dirk Zimmer died from injuries suffered a few days before when hit by a car while walking up from the river in Tivoli. Dirk was a dear member of the AboutTown family: not only a talented artist and illustrator whose work reached far beyond the pages of this paper, but a generous and multi-faceted man.

Dirk was born in Goslar, Germany in the midst of World War II, and grew up in Hamburg. The political and economic climate of post-war Germany imprinted itself deeply on him, but he could be very sentimental about early family life, such as his grandmother picking gooseberries to make his favorite jam for Christmas.

Dirk attended the Academy of Fine Arts in Hamburg, and his career as a painter got off to a good start with a number of successful shows. He made a name for himself in Germany's avant-garde, and his work was exhibited in private galleries in France, Switzerland, and Germany. He moved to the U.S. in the 1970s as part of a venture into filmmaking, an art he quickly gave up once he found himself in demand as an illustrator for such publications as the New York Times, New York magazine, and the early rock music rag Crawdaddy.

In the mid-1970s an editor at a well-known publishing house saw Dirk's illustration of dancing sausages in the New York Times, and commissioned his first children's book. Over the next thirty years he illustrated some 40 works of children's literature, including several with his own text (such as his Halloween book The Trick or Treat Trap). He became particularly well-known for the ALA Notable Children's Book award-winning In A Dark, Dark Room and Other Scary Stories. An early landmark was Egon, the odyssey of an adventurous small animal of undetermined species (for which Dirk created all the pictures before a text was written by author Larry Bograd). Since then, Egon has been translated into four languages. In 1991, Dirk was one of a group of illustrators including Maurice Sendak who contributed to The Big Book for Peace. The Mazza Museum in Findlay, Ohio, owns four pieces of his art. Founded in 1982, the Mazza is the world's first and largest teaching museum devoted to literacy and the art of children's illustrated publications. Dirk last spoke there in 2006.

The Flying Pumpkin from Dirk Zimmer's The Trick-or-Treat Trap.

While Dirk took his work very seriously and appreciated the awards and the respect he received from the professional world, he also cherished the affection of his friends, loved music, and stretched his imagination with research into all kinds of texts, printed and otherwise. Longtime close friend and fellow artist, James Warhola, recalled the many times Dirk was asked to visit schools, where he taught the kids to write, illustrate and put together their own books. James used the words scholarly, complex, passionate, cerebral, humorous, creative, analytical, and generous in attempting to describe Dirk. "He was always buying books on a great variety of complex areas. We would get into discussions, and it wasn't unusual for him to surpass my level of comprehension. He was a lover of acquiring information. Dirk was a great artist who just happened to get immense satisfaction out of creating books for kids."

Dirk's longtime friend, artist Maria Cristina Brusca, describes his art as always evolving. He wasn't afraid of change or crossing the lines between fine art, illustration, and comics. He sat every day with his big notebook and wrote down and drew a log that was both written and visual." These notebooks are extraordinary works of art in themselves: a playful, experimental dialogue a lot like the work of his beloved Dada poets and artists. "He also loved to share ideas with friends and colleagues," explained Cristina. She and fellow artists James Warhola, Alice Provenson, Melanie Hall and Dirk started a group some years ago that Dirk named The Gang. "We have been meeting for more than seven years, twice a month, to show and discuss each other's art, books, etc. That's one of the reasons we know each other's work so well. We were present at the process," explained Ms. Brusca. "We learned a lot from Dirk's analysis of design and artwork, his marvelous erudition, comprehension of visual communication, sense of humor, kindness to children, always avant-garde, always uncompromising … now his insights are a big part of what we lost when we lost him. He was unique."

Melanie Hall called Dirk iconoclastic. "He was brilliant. He had this unique style of illustration, a blend of sophistication and folk art. He was an integral part of the art scene of the Hudson Valley for more than 20 years."

Another artist, friend, and member of The Gang is Deb Lucke. She offered: "Dirk gave me some great ideas. For a book I wrote about a witch, he suggested I have her ancestors visit her from the grave and encourage her to be bad.... He was a real presence, and I miss him."

Dirk moved to the Hudson Valley in the early 1980s, the beginning of his deep love for the region. He lived in Barrytown, the Rondout in Kingston, and Tivoli—always close to the Hudson River, which he loved. When asked once, "Do you live on the river?" he replied, "No, no. I do not live on the river, but I know it is there." In later years, he collaborated with children's book author Nancy Furstinger, another member of The Gang, on a sequel to Egon titled The Sloop: Our First Scoop, in which the two main characters sailed aboard the Clearwater to research adventures on the Hudson.

This writer came to know Dirk just over a year ago. We shared a background in art and our German heritage. His gift to me was the invitation to participate in AboutTown. One Saturday morning over coffee, he shared a poignant story. In his neighborhood in Tivoli he had noticed a lone chicken. He seemed to think that the owners of the property had abandoned it, so he started to feed it. Within days, the chicken started laying eggs and he decided he needed to find a good home for it.

Dirk identified with and had a particular affection for animals of all kinds. At the end of his book Egon, Dirk's adventurous, furry alter ego leaves the following note: "I am having a good time. I will be home some day but not until the show ends. Maybe soon."

Auf wiedersehen, Dirk. Bis später.

Two panels from The Wilsons, Dirk's existential comic strip, published as a chapbook.