ESeffinga

Hilarious!

I'll say it again, but IMO, if it's not the original pencils, and industry standard (india) ink on the 1st surface of a standard comic art board, it needs mentioning. Pasteups, stats, markers, whiteout (used for correction OR as an artistic tool), gouache or any other paint, stains, restoration, damage, cleaning, vellum, non-standard size, etc. It may well tweak the prices downward a bit in some cases, and what seller wants to do that? I get it, but it also avoids far more headaches than not doing it, and it helps with provenance down the line as well if people are aware of what the condition of artwork is. And as the others have said, for many buyers it doesn't really turn people off in the long run, if they are into that artist's work. The usual explanation of it all being one of a kind, yadda yadda. Condition freaks are gonna kick it. Either ahead of time, or after the fact. Why go through the effort of packing and shipping and crossing your fingers? It just makes for a more educated market. The market adjusts accordingly. Ever notice if a piece is larger than standard art size, people trumpet it from the rafters during sale as a feature. But if a piece is smaller than a standard size board, or the art is smaller than normal ON a standard size board, or off center on said board, etc. there are plenty of sellers that forget to mention that, or will crop their sale photos such that you won't notice that the art is only half the size of the artboard. I'm a firm believer in being up front about this and all info, and I always do it with every piece I've ever sold. I like not just a good scan of a piece of OA, but a photo of the piece, showing all the edges. I'm all about being up front with what is being presented for purchase, because I do believe there is a buyer out there somewhere for every piece. But if someone strategically leaves out details of a piece when selling it, they don't go on my good guy list, that's for sure. Be up front about what you are selling, and you'll have many happy customers.

The restoration artist that repainted that orb says it looks perfect, and leave her alone!

You can count me as one of those folks that hates when artists sign INSIDE the artwork... but in this case I love it. THe sig totally blends in with the action going on around it. So artists, if you HAVE to sign a page within the panels, do it like Kirby did here! And that's an action packed piece... so VERY cool.

Drinking heavily?

Same thing here as the other Grail thread, and this isn't even really a list. Just a handful of pieces. I could go on and on and on and on....

Exactly so. And watercolor is inherently more likely to fade than most other painting methods. Expecially the case for older formulations of watercolor. All for what it's worth...

And if the new owner frames it and proudly hangs it on a well lit wall, they can quickly watch the watercolors fade out entirely, and soon be left with just the copy of the line art to look at. As such, it is actually a piece of conceptual and/or transformative art. Think of all the ways it's self degradation/destruction is representational of oh so many facets of overall life, not to mention art collecting in general. I can see the paragraphs of vinyl text applied to the gallery wall now, expounding its lessons on the loss of innocence, (and inherent value) etc and so on. This may well be the closest a piece of comic book OA comes actual museum-worthy Fine Art, even as it self destructs! But it'll clearly still not make it in the museum's permanent collection for obvious reasons.

Henry Rollins. What an interesting commission subject. If I did one, I'd want one of Henry and Glenn.

Well, I won't speak for anyone else, but I for one dig that. I've had my eye on several of Jamie's pieces in more recent years, and I kick myself regularly for passing up on a whole stack of TG pieces at Scott Eder's booth at SD in '99. I bought a Mignola Dylan Dog cover that year, and some other very forgettable stuff that I no longer have, but boy do I wish I'd grabbed up one or four of those great TG pieces four a couple hundred bucks. I'd have had my choice of some doozies.

That's a pretty good assessment for that mindset. Personally I'd be less inclined to worry about someone breaking into my house to steal my whole stash of comic art, as the impact knowing my collection's value would have on potential negotiations on new art. As you say art rich, cash poor may not enter into the mindset of the other party. Just the idea that the collector has the means if they really want to go to the wall for something they are truly interested in. And as for the habit of people choosing their words carefully (in public, and on forums), seeing as how everything is recorded and/or available these days forever, or near to, it's probably not a bad idea to be choosey in how one phrases things. I've often said becareful what bridges you are willing to burn in this hobby, as it really is a small market. And sometimes I think that plays to our detriment, as people are reticent to speak up about things for fear that one day the person they are mess-talking will be the guy with their grail piece, or some must-have bit of art. At the same time, I've seen my own attitudes change about certain people in the hobby as the years have gone on, and I'd be really bummed if things I might have said about them 10-20 years ago as a more naive collector colored the way they thought of me today. I can think of specific examples. There is a fairly well known collector , who ended up with a piece of art I was actively pursuing around... I can't recall the year it turned up. Might have been 98 or something? Anyway, I contacted the dealer about it and he suggested I come out to SDCC that year to complete the deal. I told him I couldn't do it that year because of pre-existing plans, but we discussed my buying the piece. I thought the deal was struck, and was just waiting for the shipping cost to send the funds. Anyway, the dealer took the piece to SD and sold it there. When I flipped out on the phone, he told me I should have come to SD. Oh, I was pissed. I held a grudge for near 2 decades. Never spoke to the dealer, and didn't know who the buyer was, but I was angry. Years later, and I'm on much better terms with the dealer that sold the piece out from under me. We've chatted a bit over the years, and I quite like the guy. And have come to understand the quirkiness of the way he does business. He has his reasons. And the collector that bought the piece, well I consider him a friend, even though we've yet to be in a room together. We know a lot of the same people, and share a great many other things in common. I'm sure I said things in those early years that might have soured the possibility of a relationship today. Not business relationships, but an actual friendship. And that would be a much bigger loss than losing out on that art. Maybe.

Awesome news. Bad for my wallet.

Weirdly not working for me at the moment. Never had that happen before...

Just yesterday I completed a purchase for a page that was from a "series" that was really only a couple stories long, and from 20 years ago. It was a creator owned project. But I don't even see that as the biggest factor. I think what makes a difference is, is the work still in print? And when you say is it still being published, are you speaking of new ongoing tales featuring the character with the same or new artists, or do you mean that it survives through the occasional cycle of reprints of the old stories? Vertigo characters like Shade the Changing Man, Sandman (and family) and John Constantine for instance are not creator owned, and all have had a variety of creators involved. D.C. is still making new stories with them all even now. But if those stories had been completely ended 20 years ago, I know they'd still have a fairly dedicated collector following. The original stories hold up. I think it all comes down to what book are we talking about, and how relevant is the work today? In the way that some movies hold up better decades on, I think comics work is the same. And the stuff that retains interest enough, and or relevance enough that a company thinks it can still make money on the original property through reprints, it'll still do so. And those reprints often find a new audience. Will that translate into some OA windfall down the line? Doubtful, but not entirely. The piece I picked up yesterday was a pretty penny. Being printed 20 years ago (and then reprints as a new hardcover about 7 years ago) hasn't lessened the interest among the art's collectors at all. And I've spoken with fans who only discovered the book in its reprinted form. So the availability of the work remaining in print (not necessarily ongoing) is important. But long long term, as the work's original fans age out of art collecting, then how interested will subsequent generations be? That's the real test. I'm not sure I'll be around long enough to see that completely shake out (barring global catastrophes in the meantime.)

The piece is what it is. If it was me, I'd more than likely leave it alone. Sure you can peel the stat off and see what's under there. What if you don't like what you see? Not just the drawing, but the condition of the glue under the stat? You glue it back on and have altered the original's condition for nothing, I suppose... Or you peel it up and like it better, but now it doesn't look like the published work it was used to create. So you see more of the line drawing, but it's no longer the "published page" for the purpose of semantics. It was edited for a purpose. And if you do re-glue it on there, do you plan on disclosing that to the next owner, so they know the original was tampered with? But it's hard to say for certain how I'd react. Might just depend on the exact piece. Have you tossed it on a super bright lightbox to see if you can get any sense of what's under there without pulling it totally off? I've never tried that, but it would probably be my first thought. Well that and...

I don't think I have a Gail (the one piece), I have a whole list of pieces that I'm probably have a stroke if I could bring them home though. Just a couple more recent quickies off the top of my head: I'd love to pry this away from Albert, for instance. Not gonna happen, but... http://www.comicartfans.com/GalleryPiece.asp?Piece=590613 or this piece from Arnie and Kathy... http://www.comicartfans.com/GalleryPiece.asp?Piece=904753 I'd take JL's Jeff Jones Wonder Woman cover in heartbeat. Or that Wrightson Lab image above. I could go on and on, and I don't put any one of these above the others, they all just stun me in different ways.

I'm fighting an internal struggle right now over this very thing. I've been talking to someone about picking up a piece from one of my favorite books. The pros are: I love the artist, and I love this piece. Killer image, dynamic, fun. All the elements I could ever want. It's just one of those books I have a very very soft spot for. Even more than the work the artist is most well known for. The cons: A portion of it has markers used as black filler. It's not the main feature of the art. It's almost all india ink. The marker is used in an outer area by the edges of the piece to shade a piece of machinery. At first I thought it was a thin india ink wash, not unlike a later era Mignola original, when he sent me a photo of the page with his camera flash going off, but after chatting with the art's owner and having him send me a pic of the back, I'm pretty convinced it's marker in that outer region. It's not washed out. It looks "good" right now. But I've been anti marker for so long.... Mitigating factor: I think I've counted 4, maybe 5 pieces of art (including this one) from this book that are out in the wild since publication decades ago. So it's not like I can just go out and get another piece from this book when it comes along. The question is can I hold my nose? Normally I'm a stickler for my own art collecting rules. But I'm seriously SERIOUSLY considering breaking this one (and another in the same deal, but that's a separate topic) So the question I have is, what would it take to make you break your own deal-breaker rules?!?

If Felix could get them on the podcast, I'd be like

I'd pay double to NOT have that be a feature.

I'm often surprised to find out certain folks who I interact with fairly regularly are not members. From what I can see, they do a lot of buying and/or selling/trading via items they find on CAF. To my mind it's always been a support it for the love of it situation. For some folks it's all just numbers, and if it's not required, they won't do it. One less night out with the Mrs. or whatever. But how many would leave if given an ultimatum dropped down to $10-20 a year? Not sure. I've always gotten the impression it wasn't of interest to Bill to force a fee. More that he made value added services available to the folks who recognize the true value that those services add. I can say the relatively menial amount charged for to get the "Premium membership" is hella cheap for a year's worth of potential finder's/seller's fees. I know that the classified feature alone has helped me find pieces that I've bought, and the chunks that an auction house or eBay, etc. would take from those for the sellers would be astronomical compared to the $75 for the next year's membership. Would I prefer that everyone paid into the hat for $10, so that I didn't have to pony up the $75 for those features? Sure. But then I know some folks may not ever use those features. Some folks just want to share, some to show off, some to tire kick sellers, some to hunt for new prey. But if that fee means there's less to see, and less sharing, it could potentially hurt participation. I think Bill has said before the percentage of folks that visit regularly vs the percentage that rarely visit or participate.

Oh jeez. What ever happened to common courtesy? I hope they at least see the new one.

That's awesome!

Definitely Bruce. Cool piece!

Definitely Bruce. Cool piece! Unless someone says otherwise, it doesn't look like anything I've seen in print, it just looks like one of his many character drawings just done for giggles, and posted for sale.

I can sympathize with both. I've had guys go totally tothemarketdownthestreetforsomeCRAZY because they asked me if a piece is available, and if the price is my "best". I write Guy #1 back same-day that yes the price is the price, and hear nothing back. Second guy comes along 36 hours later and says I wanna buy this. No word from the first guy, so I say OK, and sell to guy #2. Guy #1 comes back and freaks out about me about selling out from under him. He was traveling and didn't have a chance to respond. Threatens to hit all social media about me, etc and so on. Knows what kind of collector I am now, etc. and so on. It's happened a couple times in different scenarios, but at this stage, I usually just make buyer #2, etc aware that someone's inquired before them, and I'm giving them all a day to respond (making that known from the get go), so everybody gets a shot in the order they contact me. If they don't respond in short order, I move along. But it's odd what some people think is the way things should be done. And a sense of entitlement or the idea that simply asking about a piece means it's "theirs" even though they've not made it expressly known. The problem being for every one of them that is serious, there are maybe 2 dozen just tire kicking and time wasting... fantasy shopping. As if knowing they could buy a piece for a certain price is all they really wanted to know. With no interest in the actual purchase. Weird.