James Romberger is an American artist and cartoonist known for his depictions of New York’s Lower East Side. Romberger’s pastel drawings of the ravaged landscape of the Lower East Side and its citizens are in many public and private collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Brooklyn Museum in New York City.
Biography
Wojnarowicz's Apostasy

Wojnarowicz’s Apostasy

“Ants are the only insects to keep pets, use tools, make war and capture slaves.” — David Wojnarowicz A Fire in My Belly, a film with a depiction of fire ants swarming over a crucifix, was removed from the Hide/Seek exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery of the Smithsonian through the intercession of the president...
Cursing the Darkness: The Last Horrors of Alex Toth

Cursing the Darkness: The Last Horrors of Alex Toth

Fear and suspense can be effectively created by the inference of the unknown. What is shown can be less harrowing than what is implied and then forms in the imagination of the reader. The late cartoonist Alexander Toth disliked drawing explicit horror and violence in the style of E.C., what he called “gore-gulping grind and...
Charles Schulz: High Anxiety

Charles Schulz: High Anxiety

The following was originally done as a presentation for Art Spiegelman’s seminar, “Comix: Marching Into the Canon” at Columbia University in 2007. I think it suited Art’s humor to assign me to do the required audio-visual presentation on a cartoonist we both perceived as far from my usual range of interest. He certainly did me...
Toth, Internalized

Toth, Internalized

Since I am precisely the type of brutally obsessive yet overly sensitive observer that qualifies me to write for The Hooded Utilitarian, I am unable to ignore a few references I have seen online to my “fannish adoration” of the work of genius cartoonist Alex Toth. Answering them also gives me the opportunity to address...