cstojano

Hakes is sort of killing it with toy consignments, especially vintage Star Wars. So that makes sense. But in this case the consignor was quite public and vocal that HA did them wrong a number of years ago, something about posters consigned that were lost or never paid. So they are splitting the estate between Hakes and Prop Store. HA won't get their business. In the case of these strips I don't think it will make much difference on the venue. The real question is who makes this consignment choice? https://www.rockislandauction.com/detail/86/1247/documented-mauser-broomhandle-dl44-heavy-blaster-pistol-prop

As strip art goes these are underwhelming and really technically unpublished, more like fan art. Williamson was also somewhat of a poor draftsman. I mean the rendering of the characters here is quite poor and look nothing like the actors or movie portrayals. The use of zipatone is also distracting. There is also very little cross-over appeal to anyone other than a diehard SW comic art collector. Plus the IP here is on its last legs and is likely to be forgotten in a decade or two. Size wise, these are quite small, imagine how little wall power they will have. Some also have pinholes in the corner, which we all know is a deal breaker, might as well be a production stat at this point. Really there isn't much to discuss here. Have I sufficiently shown my cards? Now let this thread die people so Lucas can pay as little as possible to complete the set of 12 (we all know it will happen, just depends on how much punishment bidding we do and how late we want to stay up dragging this on).

Fedex left a 22k Hildebrandt painting on my porch. It was a massive box (48x36 in). Exposing it to the elements aside, the porch pirates are insane these days. I picked up a registered package from Germany last week and it took the guy at the post office a good 20 minutes to even find the package. I thought registered mail was under lock and key. I remember you had to use the brown paper tape for registered mail as proof the package wasn't opened and tampered with. I assume registered mail has just become a marketing slogan, much like signature required, signature confirmation, etc.

So is this a bad time to send stuff to Prop Store for their London auction? I suppose if the bidders are international it doesn't matter much, as stuff is cheaper for us in the US to bid in GBP. Ignore global macro trends, mostly focused on whether the weak GBP necessarily means weaker USD in my pocket. I think it should in some way.

This is phenomenal. I have spent so much money on framing and rarely hang them (because of plaster walls and too much sun). Do you have details on where you order the materials? Headwinds for me have been the mat itself. Michaels charges full price for a mat if not part of a package, which is stupidly expensive. Also, I spy some Heritage mailers in the closet ;)

I am in Phoenix as well. Congrats for getting out! Surface of the sun is apt. I am unsure what facilities exist locally but surely there are fine art warehouses for the rich folks to store things up in PV. I have experience with these from museum work. The one I am familiar with rented by the square foot. Theoretically they would build a custom crate to fit whatever you want and charge by the footprint.

I can't comment on the financial discussion going on here. But I can say in looking at the art, size and estimates in this catalog I can never fully believe anyone understands the European art market. https://issuu.com/artcurialbpt/docs/m1096?e=6268161/12789934

Thanks all, what I suspected. It would be nice to have a button on each listing for Premium members that would set the item for sale, move it to the For Sale folder in your galleries and push it to the top of the Classifieds listings while keeping the old likes/comments, etc.

Premium member but confused about the interface for selling. I have a FOR SALE gallery but moving pieces into this gallery does not push them to the top of the Art for Sale listings. Furthermore, I don't see a button on the various edit pages for setting a piece you have in your gallery for sale. Yes you can add a price in that field (which many do to avoid paying premium fees) but that doesn't post it as a new For Sale item. It seems you need to delete the existing listing and repost it specifically for sale in order for it show in the top of the Art for Sale section. What am I doing wrong? Note, the pieces do show up when you search for them in the classifieds. But I mostly look at the new For Sale listings, often several times per day, to see what is posted.

I can relate to this. I think there are two psychological explanations. The first is that people come in strong and when they realize they won't have the best of X OR the buying slows down/hardens OR there is a key piece they know they can't acquire they get frustrated and give up. This is fairly benign, all things considered. The second is that it is a form of mental illness. Or, a manifestation of some kind of mental illness. This involves intense passion and mania followed by a deep sinking depression spurred by feelings of self doubt and burden. The mania-burden cycle is fueled by "chasing" at any cost and overpaying. This leads to cycles, sometimes within the same conversation, of acquiring more and dumping it all.

Same. But I have had people try to treat the expenses as just the cost of doing business, which disappears when valuing.

No you are just doing something wrong. To be doing something very wrong you need my collection but hey, "I buy what I like/know".

Heritage auction threads always meander and never disappoint.

Thanks for the replies Bronty and Delekkerste. It will be interesting to see how the rest of the days go this weekend and if the market perceives an overall disappointment (with a few gems) or not. If so, I wonder if the grails will go back in the vault and consignments dry up.

I have not seen this chart but it sure does look like the world did end/change with the millennium. What's the explanation for the vastly different pre and post Y2k patterns here?

I keep waiting for housing to correct. So far not seeing it in the listings I am tracking. I have money this time universe. Please...

crickets

And make sure to disable Live Bidding so you don't misclick ;)

I'll register a guess it may be a Druillet piece.

Man I wish Otus would open a commission list or even sell the newer pieces he is doing for Goodman Games, etc.

I know someone with a good number of Sundays if you are interested.

My local station lowered their price by 2 cents last week. I waited to fill up. Prices increased by 22 cents this morning. We are approaching 6 in AZ. Glad I don't need to drive much to survive.

23k, 5x7 inches, MtG art is a force of nature.

I was told by "a guy" that would know that Matt did buy Tiamat, but this guy was also rather odd with the information so... Watching the MtG group operate is really something to behold. I don't know how much of it is speculative buying or, as I said above, nostalgia adjacent. I have 0 MtG pieces, am tempted by some but of course given my general tastes it is not the mainstream artist I find appealing (I would buy a Scott Kirschner piece if I could). The new stuff looks very flat and homogenous to me. I cannot discern artistic styles (except Donato). All the squirrel stuff just makes my scratch my head. I do know if I was an artist given a hot assignment I would certainly need to utilize an abundance of sketches and prelims to, you know, get the piece right (not to sell later, I swear). That I paid much less for a classic 80s Ian Miller Games Workshop piece than a brand new MtG piece is also interesting. Finally, I will say that MtG doing what its doing certainly sets price baselines throughout the fantasy genre. I have "overspent" on classic 80s fantasy art because, in reference to what similar buys in the new MtG realm, it all feels like a bargain.

True. But my comment was that the only pieces I would ever likely be able to take a crack at wouldn't be max nostalgia, but rather max nostalgia adjacent. A good example of what I mean is buying the Elmore cover to Dragons of Autumn twilight, but not the first edition, the later re-release. Still cool and would still take my bank roll, but isn't the cherry but a very expensive substitute.