Rest in Peace STEVE DITKO

Now that Marvel has made it big in the cinema, let's not forget where it all started.  In the beginning, in the comics world there were Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. And then there was Steve Ditko, who was the first artist to draw Peter Parker, the Amazing Spider-Man. And with help from other talented people, Stan, Jack and Steve created more than half of what made MARVEL successful in the early 1960s. Stan, Jack and Steve were the really great names behind Marvel.

It is with great sadness that I have just learned that approximately a week ago, Steve Ditko passed away, at the age of 90.

Steve Ditko in of the very few pictures around and the first ever cover starring Spider-Man

(coincidentally penciled by Jack Kirby but below you will find Steve's version)

Steve Ditko was born in 1927 and never really sought any publicity as a comic book artist. All he wanted us, readers, to know, was the work he was delivering to us. He did not want to be in any center of attention at all, himself.  I am a fan of his work on The Amazing Spider-Man as he was a magnificent artist who really succeeded in making Peter Parker look like an average young teenager. Jack Kirby was also a very good artist but he would have drawn Peter Parker too muscular. Peter Parker was a young kid, definitely what is now called a nerd, but in the day that word didn't exist but somehow Steve really captured that to the letter. Thank you, Steve, for such wonderful work.

"Puny Parker" in class at the beginning of Amazing Spider-Man 17

Steve Ditko also excelled at his art in a very different way from Jack Kirby or John Buscema and John Romita ( who would follow him in the pages of Amazing Spider-Man) and it is equally wonderful to see how he developed his art over the years, from the short stories he did in the 1950s to the Marvel blockbusters in the 1960s and the Charlton work in 1he 1970s.  Ditko's art did not seem to look like anyone else's art. It was purely his own and you could always tell it was Ditko behind it. 

A Moment of Glory for Spider-Man by Steve Ditko in Amazing Spider-Man 33

Steve also did wonderful work on one other character for Marvel: DOCTOR STRANGE, where he not only designed the Doctor  himself but created new universes beyond our mortal knowledge. In showing visually what other universes and dimensions looked like, he opened doors that can never be closed again.

left: Dr. Strange in his first appearance, looking a bit Oriental maybe?

right: Dr. Strange positioning himself in between of worlds as the Master of Mystic Arts

I am not going to recite right now how Steve Ditko started his professional career, got in the door at Marvel at the right time but left without ever fully having disclosed his reasons. Nor am I going to talk about his fondness for Objectivism. For once, I will do what he would have wanted me to do: if you want to know who Steve Ditko was, go check out his work. Go read the comics he did.  And Marvel at the ART that he delivered. For it was ART, indeed.

A wonderful example of Pure Ditko ART !!

Rest in Peace, Steve.....