A Brief Look: Mike Sutfin’s ‘Spider-Man vs Doc Ock’

 

The New York City created by artist Mike Sutfin in his piece ‘Spider-Man vs Doc Ock‘ is the urban mess of the 1970s and 1980s. The buildings. The people and the taxi cab. Each has the rough-hewn cut that only a hard city can give to those that choose to exist inside of its borders.

Sutfin’s Doc Ock is that personified. The imagined danger of the ‘Big Apple’ contained in the abrasive and brute-jawed face of Spidey’s main foe. Sutfin has shown us the Spider-Man and the city of the comic books of the ’80s when the city was a dangerous place. He pulls inspiration from the pages of The Amazing Spider-Man where the epic battles that took place in its streets and rooftops.

There’s casual chaos to the piece — the citizens unfazed by the masked hero and cyborg villain, just another day in New York City. Sutfin’s composition and color release a flood of information — even with the haze of the buildings the viewer can feel the depth of the scene.

‘The Spider-Man vs Doc Ock‘ poster is long since sold out but like all the work that Sutfin does, it is well worth the effort to track down.