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Ditko art (10/74) COMIC BOOK IMPACT rating of 4 (CBI)



Artists Information

Steve Ditko was an American comics artist and writer best known for being the co-creator of Marvel superhero Spider-Man and creator of Doctor Strange. He also made notable contributions to the character of Iron Man, revolutionizing the character's red and yellow design.

Ditko studied under Batman artist Jerry Robinson at the Cartoonist and Illustrators School in New York City. He began his professional career in 1953, working in the studio of Joe Simon and Jack Kirby, beginning as an inker and coming under the influence of artist Mort Meskin. During this time, he began his long association with Charlton Comics, where he did work in the genres of science fiction, horror, and mystery. He also co-created the superhero Captain Atom in 1960.

During the summer of 1958, writer-editor Stan Lee invited Ditko back to Atlas. Ditko would go on to contribute a large number of stories, many considered classic, to Atlas/Marvel's Strange Tales and the newly launched Amazing Adventures, Strange Worlds, Tales of Suspense and Tales to Astonish, issues of which would typically open with a Kirby-drawn monster story, followed by one or two twist-ending thrillers or sci-fi tales drawn by Don Heck, Paul Reinman, or Joe Sinnott, all capped by an often-surreal, sometimes self-reflective short by Ditko and Stan Lee. The first collaboration between Ditko and Lee was 2-Gun Western #4 (May 1956), which was also Ditko's only non-fantasy story.

These Lee-Ditko short stories proved so popular that Amazing Adventures was reformatted to feature such stories exclusively beginning with issue #7 (Dec. 1961), when the comic was rechristened Amazing Adult Fantasy, a name intended to reflect its more "sophisticated" nature, as likewise the new tagline "The magazine that respects your intelligence". Lee in 2009 described these "short, five-page filler strips that Steve and I did together", originally "placed in any of our comics that had a few extra pages to fill", as "odd fantasy tales that I'd dream up with O. Henry-type endings." Giving an early example of what would later be known as the "Marvel Method" of writer-artist collaboration, Lee said, "All I had to do was give Steve a one-line description of the plot and he'd be off and running. He'd take those skeleton outlines I had given him and turn them into classic little works of art that ended up being far cooler than I had any right to expect."

During the 1950s, Ditko also drew for Atlas Comics, a forerunner of Marvel Comics. He went on to contribute much significant work to Marvel. Ditko was the artist for the first 38 issues of The Amazing Spider-Man, co-creating much of the Spider-Man supporting characters and villains with Stan Lee. Beginning with issue #25, Ditko was also credited as the plotter. In 1966, after being the exclusive artist on The Amazing Spider-Man and the "Doctor Strange" feature in Strange Tales, Ditko left Marvel for a variety of reasons, including creative differences and unpaid royalties.

Ditko continued to work for Charlton and also DC Comics, including a revamp of the long-running character the Blue Beetle and creating or co-creating the Question, the Creeper, Shade the Changing Man, and Hawk and Dove. Ditko also began contributing to small independent publishers, where he created Mr. A, a hero reflecting the influence of Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism. Ditko largely declined to give interviews, saying he preferred to communicate through his work.

Ditko was inducted into the comics industry's Jack Kirby Hall of Fame in 1990 and into the Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame in 1994. He will be posthumously honored as a Disney Legend in 2024.

Tom Palmer is an award winning American artist best known for extensive work for Marvel Comics, including well-remembered runs paired with pencilers Neal Adams on The Avengers and Uncanny X-Men; Gene Colan, on titles such as Doctor Strange, Daredevil and Tomb of Dracula; and John Buscema, on The Avengers. He also inked the entire run of John Byrne’s X-Men: The Hidden Years, and has influenced later generations of inkers like Klaus Janson, Josef Rubinstein and Bob McLeod.

Lawrence D. Lieber is an American comic book artist and writer best known as co-creator of the Marvel Comics superheroes Iron Man, Thor, and Ant-Man; for his long stint both writing and drawing the Marvel Western Rawhide Kid; and for illustrating the newspaper comic strip The Amazing Spider-Man from 1986 to September 2018. From 1974 to 1975, he was editor of Atlas/Seaboard Comics. Lieber is the younger brother of Marvel Comics' writer, editor, and publisher Stan Lee.