This work is just sinful.
In his new comic book series “The Foreigner,” Kensuke Okabayashi explores how the Seven Deadly Sins — envy, gluttony, greed, lust, pride, sloth and wrath — can consume everyday people.
The first installment of the seven-part work explores envy, the “most pernicious of the sins.”
“It sneaks in there and we don’t want to acknowledge it,” said the Sunset Park-based artist. “We don’t want to admit that someone else has something that we want.”
In the first issue of the comic book series, envy rears its ugly head when number-crunching accountant Kazua Araga is relocated him Manhattan to DUMBO, though wishes he still was on the other side of the West River (we, on the other hand, would suffer from pride in that case, but we’re not the ones writing the book). That becomes the least of Kaz’s problems, though, when he’s thrown into an alternate realm where three feudal, robot-esque kings are locked in a bloody war he must stop — even if that means he may never see his wife again. Only then does he realize how powerful and destructive envy can be.
Out of the seven sins, Okabayashi finds he also suffers from envy the most.
“Do I still struggle like Kaz who wants that nice Manhattan office with the big promotion? Sure,” said the artist. “But I have many colleagues who are extremely successful and more talented than me, and I look to them in admiration for their skills and accomplishments.”
Kensuke Okabayashi will be selling copies from artist alley at “Sakura Matsuri” at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden [900 Washington Ave. at Eastern Parkway in Prospect Heights, (718) 623-7200] on April 30 and May 1. For info, visit www.bbg.org. “The Foreigner” is also available at piggybackstudios.com.
