Will_K

If noone can tell the difference, will your inker friend say what pieces are what ? After a while, maybe even he can't tell or remember. Now, suppose someone can't tell the difference and buys a piece from your inker friend. And maybe the inked piece changes hands a couple times. Later on, a separate piece with the "original" pencils appears. What should the owner of the inked piece be thinking? Who knows, the "original" may be falsely labelled as a prelim. Or alternate version, there are a good number of postings doubting whether art is unpublished or alternate versions of published pieces or just fakes. Unfortunately, there's no way to catalog every piece of paper that passes through an artists hands. Or document an artist's process to tell what they did on any credited work. It's not a matter of the "scarlet letter". It should be about knowing what you are buying and whether or not you think it is worth the asking price. For certain pieces, I think some people might prefer Kirby's pencils vs inked bluelines of Kirby's pencils.

At the very least, it should be printed on letterhead. I know it's better to be proactive and discuss and ask questions before buying a piece. And caveat emptor, etc. But with all the comments about how badly this and other pieces appear not to be "original", does anyone think we could be actually helping these sellers ?

Just looking briefly... The shading on Supe's right hand is different. The piece on CAF has the hand shaded up to the sleeve. Just partial shading on the ebay piece. Also the right thigh. The piece on CAF has longer stokes towards the knee than on the ebay piece. The ebay piece is definitely "inspired" by the piece on CAF.

Great idea, Lee !!! Comment: The typed question/answer format has it pluses and minuses. On the plus side, it keeps things brief. On the minus side, there's no give & take which could lead to interesting tangents, but we can't miss what isn't there. Either way, I enjoyed the read. Also, any time I've seen Mitch post something on this board, he's brief and to the point. Mitch is the only art dealer that I had regular dealings with. My first Cardy cover (also my first Cardy piece) came from him. It was in a catalog but I actually bought it at a show. Quite a few of my favorite Cardy pieces came by way of Mitch. Man, I sent Mitch so many checks, I wouldn't have to look up his address, even now, it's burned into my brain. I still have all of Mitch's Graphic Collectible catalogs since I began receiving them. Helpful hint, I unfolded and flattened the smaller catalogs so they are 8 1/2 x 11. They're less bulky. Then you can save them along with the large, true 8 1/2 x 11 catalogs.

I'm not a lawyer but here's a conspiracy theory... is it possible that "We Present this art in the manner of the artist" gives the seller an out if anyone questions whether or not the art was drawn BY Jack Kirby ?? Could the seller say... Well, we didn't say it was drawn BY Jack Kirby, we just said it was SIGNED "Jack Kirby". Conversely if someone drew something in Kirby's style but the art is SIGNED "Charles M Schulz". Noone could realistically claim the art is drawn in the manner of Charles M Schulz

Well, in very small red print it does say: "To Fallow Ebay Rules and Regulation We Present this art in the manner of the artist" See: http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/selling-art.html

I'd say I'm be the opposite of a fanboy. And I think the podcast generally advocates against "fanboy-ism". I think it suggests being a little more deliberate about how you spend $$$ on this hobby.

Listening to the Gene Park (guest starring Andy Robbins) podcast for the 3rd time (so far) today.

The article says Bob Bendetson (the owner and not the artist) "picked up the original art direct from Universal Studios decades ago" You could replace "Universal Studios" with "the Marvel office" and there you go... I wonder if the John Alvin's heirs are following the auction. A similar example may be Roger Kastel's art to Jaws. It is a rare (if not the only example) of the same art being featured on the book and movie poster. However, the original Jaws book cover by a different artist had the same composition except the shark and swimmer were more abstract. Apparently Roger IS the owner of the painting but he's not in possession of it. And they do not know where it is.

The cold press illo board and the fact its unsigned (Joe signed pretty well everything as I recall!) mean I wouldn't touch it, personally. I'd guess its some sort of student work from someone that attended the Kubert school, perhaps? It looks like it has age so I don't think its something done yesterday as a fake but rather someone practicing their own art by looking at Joe's. A cursory Google search indicates Flaxon illustration board may not be readily available unless it's new old stock. Even if you can't lightbox an image onto illustration board, you could always use a projector. The blacks look very flat. Also, lines and figures on the left/right borders appear to be cropped way too evenly. Also, the bottom edge seems to folded over just a little bit. This may be a print that's mounted to the board. Just speculation.

+1 on all the kudos Once, I went to one of those "liquidation" auctions at a hotel. Oriental rugs, furniture, sculpture, paintings, etc. During the bidding for a rug, the auctioneer said something to spur the bidding and has stuck with me ever since... it was something along the lines of "you'll never make a rug but you can always make more money". Once in a while that made me pull the trigger on getting some OA. Sadly, nowadays, I don't have to think of that auctioneer in order to overspend.