fsumavila

On 6/11/2022 at 2:20 AM, Brian Peck said:

What does everyone think about the final hammer of $25K for the final inked original art of the ad for Sons of Origin of Marvel Comics by John Romita Sr.?

 

https://www.comicconnect.com/item/955545?tzf=1

 

Great piece and I bet this winds up on a dealer's site for double that price very soon. It's an incredible image -- and AFAIK, the published painting has never surfaced. I spent years trying to track down the whereabouts of the Fireside painted covers, and I never heard a peep about this. I'm actually surprised the Sons of Origins painting hasn't popped up yet with so many black hole collections finally opening up.

On 6/9/2022 at 8:26 AM, jjonahjameson11 said:

I'm not a fan of clink, but I'll play devils advocate for a moment...The Buscema FF 112 page went for a very strong price, as did the Kubert Wolverine 75 splash and pretty much all of the Romita Jr pieces (actually, they were very strong prices for his work).  Bagley prices continued their upwards climb.  Grampa continues to impress.  Dillin JLA prices have rebounded rather nicely after taking a dive a few years ago.  

 

 

I'm not sure about those others but all the Romita Jr pieces seemed to do very well.

I went after the Dazzler #3 splash but had to bow out after it went above $10k. Love that page, but just couldn't go any higher.

Hi folks,

I have a few really nice OA examples that end tonight in ComicLink's Spring Auction that you may be interested in.

Batman: Son of the Demon, pg 60 - by Jerry Bingham.

When was the last time you saw a page from this classic story come up for sale? It's a twice-up page featuring Batman and Talia.

Amazing Spider-Man Pro Action #3, page 10 - by Keith Pollard.

Just a killer Spidey page by an awesome artist featuring 4 of his greatest villains at once - Venom, Carnage, Doc Ock and the Kingpin.

Y: The Last Man #18, page 15 - by Pia Guerra.

A beautifully drawn page from an early part of the legendary series featuring Yorick, Agent 355, Agent 711 and Alison Mann.

Thanks for checking them out.

Mike

On 5/25/2022 at 3:30 PM, Pantodude said:

That's a great copy!

On 6/3/2022 at 1:41 PM, Terry JSA said:

Whoever won this book got it for a steal. Also, it would’ve been mine if someone didn’t outbid me by $250.

that is a great price for that book.

On 5/23/2022 at 3:07 PM, comix4fun said:

Nothing in comic art or any collectibles category is valued solely on quality, much as we might twist ourselves into pretzels analyzing ink lines and pencil flourishes. Otherwise a really good Miller painting of a bowl of peaches would be the same price as a really good DD cover. The element of enmeshed nostalgia along with pop culture significance makes up the majority of the valuation of the pieces we all collect in this hobby. 

The love of the story, or title, or character, or plot, or era of comics makes up a solid 95% (or more) of where asking/selling/trading prices and values come from. As items lacking entirely in utility and are solely emotional purchases based on illogical rationale that comes with the territory. 

If anyone was actually buying purely from an artistic perspective and ignoring, entirely, the artist's name, reputation, legacy, and the characters, titles, and stories included today's market might be flipped entirely on its head. There are plenty of unattributed pieces and pieces by people with no name in the hobby that are GORGEOUS but wouldn't hammer for $500...but put the right combo of artist, title, character, and nostalgia/history and it's $500,000.

Also, for anyone who actually lived through and reveled in the era of DKR in real time when it was first released, this series was an earthquake in the middle of the hobby. The lasting impact of the story and its influence on fans and future artists is still being felt. That makes a cover with "technical anatomy" issues "legendary". That's why almost every comic fan would take a DK Cover over any random Batman cover regardless of qualities outside of the sum total of DK #1's impact on comics.

So, where this piece ends at auction as almost nothing to do with how pretty or ugly a Batman cover it is. 

This just about sums it up.

On 5/20/2022 at 1:02 PM, ft88 said:

Maus Vol 1, 2 (1 TPB 2 HC)

 

$30 for both

"TAKE IT" ... 

On 5/14/2022 at 3:51 AM, Monsterhoodoo said:

Hi Ricky Bobby.  I assume that’s a screen name. Mine is John Butler. Yes, I owned it for a bit longer than 10 months. And that link to Rob Stiefel's piece on the Kirby Museum page that you posted was written before I had researched the piece. I think it’s human nature probably (or at least mine) to defend something you own or care about. And I did at the time, as Eriks post sort of blind-sided me. But then I spoke with several people. Kirby scholars? Well, I’m not sure about that designation. But Mark McDermott's name never really came up alongside some of the dealers, artists, and collectors that I spoke with. Greg Theakston, Joe Mannarino, Mike T, Todd Seisser, Glen Gold, Erik Larsen, and David Schwartz did-- I would consider all to be at least educated and knowledgeable about Kirby because they all either knew him or have done the work to know about him for decades. I spoke to all of them. The only guy I couldn’t get to was Evanier. He never answered me. The rest did, and rather quickly.

 All had slightly different things to say, some just weren’t sure and couldn’t really say other than to mention they saw it on Jack’s wall at one point, (that was literally the best piece of info anyone had as to its legitimacy… didn’t pass the sniff test for me) some were certain it was mostly done by another hand… none said, “Oh no, that’s Jack and Jack alone.”

 So, just an opinion here, but that came after a lot of research and an open mind. The key clues for me were

 1. The back of the piece is bone white. So, it never hit Jacks' drawing board which made very specific graphite smudges on the backs of his art. Possible that he did it elsewhere, but that was a rare occurrence.

 2. If you look at pieces Jack did in the late 80s, as you mention as the time period that this was done, they are wonky. Nothing like this.

 3. The piece is very tightly rendered. Some of it looks outlined and filled in. Jack worked with the edge of his pencil and spit the graphite out like he was chiseling, it’s just far too meticulous. Like those cover recreations from the 90s… possibly by the same hand. Look at other Kirby pencil pieces. This is very different.

 4. The pieces the artist traced or used as reference are clear if you look at other Kirby work. The Surfer Sketch from the Kirby Collector issue 48, and a flopped surfer drawing by Kirby and Sinnott from a Marvel Portfolio done in 1979 (with modifications) is the main surfer body. I’ve lined them up in Photoshop and they come pretty darn close.  The Doom head is from a panel in FF #59, and an exploding planet from the Gods portfolio is at least part of the background. I think it would have been odd for Jack to have traced these out. He just didn’t do that. And these are almost exact. The Doom head scales up perfectly, except for the eyeballs.

 5. The erased leg. Kirby just wouldn't have done that.

 Of course, people will believe what they want. Probably Rob's designation as The Studio of Jack Kirby is about as accurate as one can be with the piece. Someone else's hand is in there. I have a pretty good idea whose it is, but I’m not comfortable saying who that is here. How much Jack is in there if at all? Who knows? Unless the Kirby estate wants to say and that’s probably not going to happen. But I personally think there is very little. But I also don’t think it’s a forgery, as Erik originally stated.  I believe someone helped Jack out because he and Roz needed the dough, and it was a decent thing to do between friends. Now that stuff is worth thousands of dollars, I think it matters.

 So, I flipped it back through Heritage. They gave me a slightly better deal than the hammer price in the end, but I still lost money. But I made sure people knew what they were getting and wrote the auction description myself, with some additions by Todd Hignite. I did write a lengthy article about this in the APA as Felix mentioned. I won’t post that here for anyone to download, but if you want to read it, I think it's in issue 102. This is really what it says though--  Most were kind enough to talk to me about it and help me come to my conclusion, but of course, we’ll probably never really know for sure.

Fascinating read. Thanks for this post, John.

On 4/29/2022 at 3:53 PM, zhamlau said:

That .235 hitter with 5 wouldn’t be allowed to stay in the bigs for 25 years is the issue. You only hold a spot that long if you were producing at a high level consistently. 

Exactly. If we want to keep with the baseball analogy, Sal was so consistently good he has fans who prefer runs he penciled, decades apart. Just because he was never the BEST artist of an era doesn't mean he wasn't great. It just means his consistency may have led to people taking him for granted.

On 4/27/2022 at 7:51 AM, gumbydarnit said:

I might ignore all the pms that claim to be helping you out when those pms end with an offer : )

Absolutely. If you're unsure about pricing, consult Heritage's auction archive and consider consigning them. The art market is on fire and you have some excellent pieces.

On 4/26/2022 at 12:30 PM, zhamlau said:

Ha....I don't check in on the boards for a bit and a little anarchy ensues.

Well, it appears ARTSOC has failed in our noble effort to keep "The Average" in his place. Even party loyalists are coming out admitting his importance and value to the industry and among his peers...I never thought I would see the day...

So, all cards on the table I guess. I like Sal (obviously) both as an artist but also as a historically significant comic book artist. My thoughts on this are pretty clear.

  1. 7th all time on the pages pencilled list. That alone makes you one of the greats. You don't get that much work if you aren't that skilled. Inkers can something slide by with lesser efforts and still get paid, pencillers not so much.

  2. . Worked consistently from 1968-2014 due to the caliber of his craft and not just nostalgia like most others on this list. He even worked on a story in 2020 for marvel, and the work was still good. To be consistent for so many decades and be able to work on so many varied stories for so many different publishers, I can't think of anyone else like him in that regard.

3. 34th all time most pages inked, that alone is impressive. Whats more though, I think the only guy on both lists with similar numbers is John Byrne (and he was mostly just inking himself). To be able to mesh with so many other artists as both a penciller and inker to the point you are HOF caliber in both over a 50+ year span, that is unique in comic book history. 

4. The man is 86 years old, and he is still doing high quality commissions of varied and unique characters. I've seen work from him over the last 5 years that looked like something he could have done in the 1970's (my favorite era for his work). How many artists have ever been capable of that? So many later in life commissions by some of the greats are mere shadows of the work they produced while in their prime. The same can no be said for Sal's output. That shows a love and dedication to the craft. That means something, at least to me. 

5. The man did almost 14k pages while only working on 675 stories. Think about that, most of these guys "padded" those numbers by doing tons of fill in pages on huge jam books with multiple artists. Sal's output is almost exclusively as a penciller on books he was the primary artist on. The books sank or swam with him as the artist because he was usually pencilling all the pages. And he was so good, so consistent, he was given decades and decades of first run titles to pencil and almost all from the varied main stream publishers. It wasn't all self published or single character runs for one company. He could and did work as the primary artist carrying the book on dozens and dozens of different runs. He could and did work on any almost any character for any publisher who needed quality work done in quick order.

 

Anyway, those are my thoughts on the guy. Him being a good dude who is humble as heck and good to fans of course plays a part in this as well. But just on the quality, scope, and longevity of his work I say the man is a top 10 comic book artist of all time and a top 5 marvel artist specifically.

ALL OF THIS. 

I'll also add that aside from an astounding amount of work, Sal was involved with countless runs that are considered classics. The guy is a fantastic storyteller.

On 4/12/2022 at 1:33 PM, RBerman said:

What we need is not necessarily for ComicLink to improve, but for somebody to improve so that Heritage's hegemony doesn't distort the market further. It would be great if ComicLink wanted to rise to that occasion, but if not them, who will?

Seems to me that the biggest obstacle to higher sales on CL is the snipe-based auction conclusion, rather than allowing bidders to duke it out, taking each piece to higher valuations until someone drops out. That would take a complete rewrite of their auction interface, but it could be done.

great point. The snipe system is ridiculous 

On 4/12/2022 at 12:34 PM, cloud cloddie said:

There’ve been countless conversations and suggestions over the years, and it’s clear that Clink gives zero fs about updating their business. I’ve come to accept it. With HA’s fees, I still think Clink is the better option for lower priced items - I used to think sub 10K, but I’d probably adjust to sub 5K at this point. Eventually, they’ll stop being any kind of competition and HA will have a stranglehold on the market - which will be good for nobody but HA. 

It's so frustrating. They could improve their operations in a bare minimum fashion and entrench themselves as a go-to site for the 10K-and-under market, but they don't seem to have the desire to upgrade. 

We (being collectors/consignors) need Heritage to have some competition; right now they have zero motivation to self-evaluate their business practices and figure out ways to do a better job with their auctions. And yes, the blue-chip art and comics are setting records and likely always will, but the mid-level range of stuff may get hurt by auctions with nearly 1,000 lots.

On 4/11/2022 at 6:30 PM, Bill C said:

I wonder if a lot of it can be attributed to growing pains/taking on too much. This last auction went so long at points, I wonder if another signature auction per year is warranted.

It was way too long with too many pieces - nearly 1,000.

I get that Heritage is concerned with the vig they make off each auction, but having such a bloated auction isn't ideal for its customer base. Not so much for the blue-chip stuff, but mid-level art certainly was impacted by the sheer number of items in this auction. 

On 4/11/2022 at 2:27 PM, Kryptic1 said:

Congrats.  I was watching that one and would have gone after it harder if I hadn’t won something earlier.  Definitely a bargain compared to the crazy prices his style guides were selling for last year.

Thanks. Yeah, I've lost out on every other JLGL style guide page I've gone after so happy to get this one -- and at a relative bargain. The fact that they were buried on Day 4 of this auction made no sense to me. But then again, there were many decisions made by Heritage with this auction that made little sense to me. 

This is the rare Heritage auction where I actually won something. Took home the Garcia Lopez Wonder Woman style guide page for what I thought was quite the bargain. Heritage over stuffing this auction didn't do the seller of the 3 style guide pages any favors. The Superman page went for about double what the Batman page went for, which I didn't understand. Regardless, I'm happy to get the one I really wanted.

On 4/8/2022 at 11:48 PM, Bronty said:

I get the perceived conflict, but ask yourself - would you want someone who ISN’T a collector and who doesn’t understand every nuance of how we tick in his position?   Would you want someone who doesn’t know who ditko and Kirby are running an outfit like that?    
 

I think people just like to complain.   If he wasn’t a collector people would be pining for someone that understands them.    And since he is a collector people complain about conflict.     Either way, people complain.    

Sure, it's great to have someone who knows the material running heritage. But iask

yourself this: if you're competing against that guy at auction for art, can you be 100% certain you're on a level playing field?

Someone make this auction make sense to me. Please. Because I don't get it.

I can't believe an Omega the Unknown cover went for $19.2K w/the juice. Who knew there was an Electro tax now on OA???

On 4/7/2022 at 2:19 PM, delekkerste said:

Wow, $180K. Beautiful DPS for sure, but, I didn't think a Magneto/Rogue/Ka-zar//Zabu DPS was going to get to that kind of price. 

That escalated quickly!

Hi folks,

I know this auction isn't flying under anyone's radar, but i figure it wouldn't hurt to do a little self-promotion.

I have 3 pieces in this week's Heritage auction:

The cover to Dazzler #1 by Bob Larkin

Star Wars #85 (original Marvel series) page 4 panel page by Bob McLeod w/some nice Han Solo, Lando & Chewie images -- and Ewoks!

Captain America #210 page 8 by the Jack Kirby/Mike Royer featuring some awesome Falcon work by the King !

Hopefully you'll check it out. Regardless, good luck with whatever you're chasing in the auction!

https://www.ha.com/c/search.zx?saleNo=7270&collection=40&type=friend-consignorlive-notice&FC=0

Mike