From 1959 on, when the Tobacco Manufacturer in Lahr in Baden handed over the graphic management of its Reval brand to Gerd Grimm -- for the next 23 years! -- he finally had a regular income. It gave him the opportunity to travel extensively around the world. While he ventured into the furthest corners of the earth to Bolivia, South Africa or Alaska, his wife Hildegarde van Gülick remained at home in Freiburg-Littenweiler.

What attracted Grimm again and again was magically the USA, especially New York. For hours he walked through the streets to absorb the impressions, made sketches, but also photographed many motifs, in order to translate them into drawings later on. What fascinated him was the pulse beat of the giant metropolis, the people in their time arrest, their gestures, their lifestyle. In 1988, Grimm expressed himself on his New York Mania like this:

"Why am I drawing here? Well, once I draw everywhere and everything (except children and dogs), why should I skip NY? On the other hand, since I live mostly from (drawn) pretty girls, I sometimes need some alternation: water reservoirs, Negroes, hydrants, Irish, graffiti, Muggers. Maybe Greta Garbo in the Lexington passes me by, a bit aged but still with beautiful bones under her wrinkles. Or Eric Fischl - but who cares for them anymore. By the way, you have to walk New York, so 5-7 hours a day on bad asphalt, so train first. Since this inhospitable city has hardly any cafés or pubs, the best place to rest is the Public Library, a very comfortable bank in the middle of the street under a beautiful painting by Munkacsy: the blind Milton dictates "Lost Paradise" to his daughters. When throwing the coca can away, watch out for possible guards."