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the first statement is very true. The second one, I’d add a qualifier to. It depends. A great inker can really save a bad pencil job if they are inclined to. I think guys like K. Nowlan and PC Russell have really saved more than their share of jobs over the years. But way more often than not, many (MANY!!!!!!) comic artists over render what is essentially a lousy drawing underneath, and it’s gotten worse over the decades. And not just over rendering in link, but with the colorist, etc. Everyone trying to polish turds. cough...90s Image...cough But then there are folks that strip it back. Not every 80s Paul Smith X-Men page is a home run, but he damn sure nailed a lot of them. Keith Pollard knew what was up. Just a couple of “lesser” known names that worked without a big net, gave up great anatomy, and beautifully composed panels. Every line carefully considered, and placed where it belongs. But what happens more often than not is people without a terribly strong grasp of observation will ooh and ahh over the vast number of lines, and crosshatching, and shading and “polish” that get heaped onto a drawing. Seeing the surface, and not the bones of what is actually there. And circling back to digital drawn blue lines, vs pencils scanned and reproduced as blue lines... and also the inking saving the job. Skottie Young was mentioned above. I’ll chuck in James Harren as another. There are many more. Guys who will do loose pencils (traditionally or digitally) that are nothing more than guides to figure out a composition. All their “real” drawing takes place in the inking stage. All the adjustments, the attack, the nuance and details. I have said this many times over the years, but many artists find inking a pencil drawing can stiffen up the drawing, as they lose a certain spontaneity in their line work. The gestures are replicating gestures underneath, rather than initial and organic. Kind of like trying to trace someone’s signature. So more artists are discovering if they really just go for it with ink, they can keep a spontaneous and lively looking drawing that isn’t just frozen there, but gives off a certain devil may care kinetic energy that can’t get otherwise. In which case the pencils are nothing more than loose framework onto which they can play. And for more modern artists, many real artistic decisions are happening at the ink stage of the work. There are a lot of guys that started messing with this more and more beginning back in the 90s. And there are guys like Ashley Wood, George Pratt, Kim Jung Gi or Jon Muth that have honed their craft so precisely that they can just draw in ink, conjuring images out of think air eschewing pencilling altogether. Not everything is a success, but they scrap the bad and publish the incredible.

Did you ask his brother?

GrapeApe saying he gives comic art to all family as “gifts” also. “Happy Birthday honey” gives some Chaykin Flagg art.” “Hey sweetie, happy anniversary.” Gift is Kirby Kamandi. “You know, for the spot over the sofa.”

I am actually not surprised to see this epiphany of sorts, regarding JB’s place in the pantheon at Marvel. I’ve never really jumped in on the threads about JBs work or his various inking team ups etc. But the one thing that always struck me in such threads by his detractors was, he was the guy that drew the book on Marvel’s house style. Literally. And, I get it. The book was as much as anything, aimed at kids who were tracing their comics, learning their anatomy from a book about comic characters. Marvel were hopping on a bandwagon of books that taught you how to draw this or that by way of teaching basics of rough observation, using simple shapes at first, etc. but mostly how to ape a “style” of work that was in many ways a lack of style, by amalgamating a bunch of techniques drawn from the previous decades of much more defined artists’ work. It could be argued that book caused such an artistic stagnation among would-be Marvel artists that lasted for a long time. All that out of the way, Marvel could have had any number of folks put that particular book together for them, but they went to the guy that best epitomized the “Marvel Way” at that point and time. For a generation of kids, he really did crystallize a look for a lot of characters. And for many, he showed them how to draw throwing a punch.

One of several cover roughs for Mad Love...

Hope the shipping cost wasn’t inflated to cover insurance or something? He’ll be sad To discover if it’s damaged and files a claim, that there’s no way any of the carriers, shipping insurances will cover it, even if he pays full freight on the insurance cost. Or maybe it’s via a more white glove shipping service, door to door? Ill tell you one thing. I sure wouldn’t trust a piece that spendy to USPS. Buyer might not see it for a month or two. FedEx first overnight plus a packing/shipping service, so they gotta cover the insurance?

Assuming you are only about the well heeled fans ending up with any art they want whenever they want it. Felix has said before they like for art to get into a variety of hands, rather than those of a select few. FWIW.

I do not. Back in late 1991 I went to one of the local comic book shows. The kind where every month the organizers would book a meeting room or ballroom or 2 in a hotel just outside DC. And so ever month or couple months, I would go into the room looking for comics.l, and occasionally an old toy or something fun. At this specific show though, I was looking at some comics on a wall and looked down at the dealer’s table. To his left, laying on the table was a nondescript low flat box with... original comic pages stacked in it. Not a lot. Maybe a few dozen or so. My mind was blown. I think many of us had this epiphany moment at some point. “You mean you can own the actual art pages?!?” It was an instant connection for me. I was drawing incessantly myself. I was doing art in school, and just starting to work as a designer as well. So seeing someone else’s art work in the flesh was amazing on many levels. I had to have something. Flipped through the stack, and the only thing I recognized was a page from Shade the Changing Man by Colleen Doran. I hadn’t even read that issue yet. Just bought the page for a whopping $65. No one else at the show had any comic art. The internet hadn’t really kicked off yet, much less dealer sites. That was a long way off. I took the page home like it was the Ark of the Covenant. Within the year I had it framed. I also started finding other art at the local shows. Bought from a dealer that I am pretty sure was Scott Dunbier, selling painted art from Jon Muth and Dave McKean at our local hotel shows. Then I discovered the print ads And want ad sections in Comic Buyers Guide, and started calling folks (cause that is how it was done), and I was off to the races. Many years later, in consolidating my collection, I looked at that Shade page and thought, artistically and story wise it wasn’t significant. It was massively significant in getting me started. A milestone. But I sold it, along with many other early purchases. I don’t miss it, but do think kindly of it.

Question: what part of the world is this being done in? Is this color or black and white? Does that price even include shipping? Depending on what they are doing, I am not at all surprised at that figure. Could be a cash grab, or it could be 100% legitimate. Especially if the artist is choosing to outsource their digital art for print. I know many digital print houses here in the States that have a $80-100 minimum just to push a button and print you whatever comes out on archival paper with archival inks. Some are more than that. Especially depending on size. Then there is the matter of image correction. Depending on the artist, they may want the print to look a certain way, but the color or grays may not come out of the machine exactly as imagined. So then you are into color correcting. They could run 20 rounds of prints on paper, to come up with the one good one that you receive (the rest going in the trash). Many fine artists spend days doing this to get things just right for a small signed print run. Imagine the "pressure" they feel if this is a 1/1 of their creation? It is supposed to represent what they do in the world. So in the worlds I've traveled digital printing company wise, a small print like this could be $350 all by itself. Not including paying an artist for their work. Not covering shipping, or a dealer's cut or anything else. Just the printing. The biggest hangup I have with digital printing and 1/1 print originals are the costs inherent in making the art into "art". At a low dollar value like this, it wouldn't surprise me if the printing company makes more off this sale than the artist. how jacked up is that? And that $350, you are paying a big chunk to someone other than the artist to make what will represent that artist. So many ways where a piece created in the flesh with human hands is superior, no matter how a given artist prefers to work. Chances are they aren't jumping through quite so many hoops, but $200-350 feels like it's all in the same ballpark anyway. Not a $2000 digital print. or a $8000 digital print... now you are getting into really paying up for the art. I've seen 1-off digital prints of non-household name artists sell out at $15K - 25K+ through some more fine art galleries. That's a tough pill to swallow.

I had long said I wanted to see a clever Batman detective movie not unlike Fincher's Seven , but with Zsasz. Or some other tale that was super clever, like some of the old Sherlock stories. Something that really had you on the edge of your seat, and not trying to be so brutal visually but more mentally brutal. I've read recently that this is what they have tried to do with the current Batman film, but with so many "stars" filling supervillan roles, I can't see how just yet, and still devote enough time to actual story. Reserving judgement. Yeah, I'll prolly watch it at some point. And there are those that want Batman to go back to the days of Batman shrunk onto the wacky giant piano, etc. I've no personal need of Bat Shark repellant.

A few more musings on the Manga and European comic markets. IMO the US may have "invented" the modern comic book, but those Euro and Manga artists have been essentially schooling americans for decades. Frank Miller is for many, seen as the auteur of his time, but look at his work and influences. Frank was massively influenced by those artists. So why is Frank a household name in the US, and so many of his influencers are not? English, man. English. The US as a culture is lazy. It tends to want everything handed to it on a plate, and we sure aren't going out of our way to learn another language in order to read something. But that talent was always there across the globe. Wanna know why so much Manga thrives in the US now, but not so much in the 80s when Frank was studying it and on the rise? It's being translated into English. And the publishers have been making bank on it ever since. And so many new comic artists are heavily inspired by that Manga influence, either overtly, or just internalizing it and coming up with their own interpretation of it. Doing what all good art does. Beg, borrow and steal until it is internalized, and comes out looking fresh and new. But the real driver in those non-US markets is creativity and freedom to stretch out. Bucketloads of unique stories and worlds, with distinctly unique visual styles emerging among the din of sameness. Cream rises to the top. The US has, since the whole Wertham debacle, been a nation of prudes that see comic books (and animation) as the bastion of children and the under developed man-child. Where in other parts of the globe, the art form has been not only allowed to grow and be nurtured in the way that film has been, but like the best films, it has pushed boundaries outward, and found acceptance in the main stream as a bit of something for everybody. It's not a stigma or a weird thing for an adult to read a comic. And the material is reflected in what they present. They are long past nostalgia trip being the biggest game in town. IMO the Big 2's approach to the US comics market is just milking it's past glories, and recycling them ad-infinitum for fast cash, and missing the biggest picture of all. Some of the other publishers have learned some lessons, and their most successful books look to be those that are breaking these cycles. One other interesting comparison in work ethic. Those Manga guys are workhorses in the Kirby vein. Way more than most US artists are. Everyone here thinks they are an Artist with a cap A, and they should be lauded and cheered every time the string 4 books together and put them out as a "graphic novel". Put that up against the sheer volumes of stellar work some of the best known names in Manga have managed to accumulate. The closest thing the US has are the sheer volume of Kirby, or from the indy side, Dave Sim? I'm excited to see how things shake out, personally. Bring on the new chit! And unlike Vodou, I actually think there is a place for those glorious color European hardcover volumes. I have some. They are amazing. They work there. They can work here. They just don't need to be printed in a gajillion copies and dumped on Barnes & Noble and Amazon until they drop to $6.95 sale prices. Smaller volume. Find out what is a hit, and what sells great, then do the big volume release. I just watched a documentary last night on Steve Madden, and his shoe company. They make small "artisan" runs of shoes and put them in their stores. Find out what sells great, and then go into mass production. The small artier stuff still gets published but in small numbers. The ones that are going to be a smash hit, get the big time treatment thereafter. Seems to me like a lot of comics could learn a thing or two from this model. Not having a huge organization trying to justify their existence to stockholders in the corporate world, clinging on the backs of the artists and printers doing the actual work, is a pretty good way to streamline things. The big 2 have largely outgrown real comics, IMO. They are really just flailing promotional companies in disguise.

I thought Blair as well, or at least someone very inspired by him. Have you taken it out of the frame to see if it's signed under the mat board, or the back?

IMO negotiating with a dealer and negotiating with an artist/rep can be very different things. I would happily negotiate with any dealer, or at least come with a specific offer, and go from there. The longer something has sat around unsold, the better chances of making a deal on it. Also the less likely you will ever be able to move it if you decide to sell it later on. So know what you are buying into. When it comes to artists reps, and especially artists in general, I'd treat that a bit different. IMO, if anyone deserves top dollar out of an artist's work, it's not me, it's the artist. Whether I chose to buy it or not is up to me. I'm not about to come at an artist, trying to dicker them down if I'm not a known entity to them beforehand. i.e. I might float an offer to an artist or their rep, but only after they know A.) I'm not out to chisel them down and then flip their art for the difference (or more), because - d i c k m o v e - If I really consider myself a fan, I'm not out to get one over or make myself a sweetheart deal on the back of someone trying to make a very hard living. Many artists aren't equipped for it, and some will be downright offended. You get more flies with honey, in my experience. Now, if I am known to a rep or artist directly, and they've had something I personally wanted for myself for a good long while (I'm thinking years, not months), I am not afraid to float a possible deal or two here or there. At least then they know who I am, and where I'm coming from. hopefully we've built up some rapport over time, and even if they can't do it, I don't feel like a jerk for asking. And often, if they know who you are and where you stand, they will accept the offer, just to feel like they are placing the art somewhere reputable. IMO, as with many fields, but especially comic art, reputation is worth WAY more than a few bucks. Word gets around. Artists and dealers all talk. Etc. As for who is the best and who is the worst... reading through any lists like this, I always see names that people consider bad, that I've had good experiences with, and other names that people had good experiences with who have done me dirty. We all have off days. We all have some good and bad experiences. The most important thing is to find out the names that come up over and over again. (cough...donnellybros...cough), and try to avoid them at all costs. Beyond that, just allow for a differing level of experiences. Even the best dealers and reps have had snafus. Shipping go bad. Missed communications, etc. That's all just part of the game. Work with enough dealers enough, and you'll figure out most of them are on the up and up.

Except this extends back years and years before AT&T... anyone that hasn't already really should read Marvel The Untold Story. It gives a fly on the wall view of what it is like to make comics (or any art) via any corporate infrastructure.

I'm with Vodou 100%. Manga sells a ton of books to western kids. I don't hear stories about Dark Horse about to go under (personnel issues, yeah), but something happened to the comics market in the 90s, and those repercussions IMO, are still being felt. I see young people in the comic shop every time I go in. Not kids, but "kids" to me. Folks in their teens and 20s going in to pick up stuff I've never even heard of before. The shop I like to go to has SO many small titles on the shelves right now, I couldn't even possibly read them all in my lifetime I have left. And it is for that, I have tried to order from them a few times during this whole COVID mess. I hope they can ride out the storm. But even still, creators aren't going to stop creating or being creative. Video games, blah blah blah. You know what else isn't as popular as going to the movies? Reading a book. And yet books are still published profitably all the time. Do publishers come and go? Absolutely. Even ancient established ones. But as much as anything, today's market is about product. And quite frankly, I think the splintering of the media pie will continue to fracture. And what that won't support is big hulking corporations, carrying the weight of massive staff of middle management, etc. It's increasingly about creators connecting with audiences, and having less in the way. Making less than having a massive audience, but knowing when to say when. not over-growing, and over producing. And filling landfills with product that doesn't find a real buyer. So much waste. So much hope that the thing someone else created 50-70 years ago can sustain your corporation all the way to the bank. I think the stories the big 2 give us rely on a massive crutch. A shorthand that you already know who Batman is, let's recycle that package with today's emulation of a news topic dujour, and address that issue through the lens of an IP? How much traction can that really have long term before the world tires of it? I read a series of tweets via a blog this morning that basically opined Batman is a character that belongs in the past. In a nutshell, the author suggests that as Warners/DC has made Batman darker and more realistic, the writers aren't superior intellects, and haven't been clever enough to come up with a story that really involves Batman using his superior intellect to solve. So instead he is more like the armored police that we see more of today. Except he can do things the police can't, like beat a confession out of you. Hold you off a roof and scare you for information. And show up and break your bones for breaking the law. Batman isn't so far removed from the police in equipment and gadgets. Not like the Batman of old, who was far more advanced than the police, etc. That the more real Batman becomes, the more he's just a vigilante thug to inspire other vigilante thugs. I'm not here to defend the guys tweets. I actually had a lot of issues with the statements he made (as a long time Batman fan myself), but the truth is that it made me think these characters who have enjoyed many years as multiple generations' stand ins for Greek gods/myths, have evolved so much. At what point does the elasticity of a rewrite just become like a loose rubber band? Overstretched to the point where it can't do the job, and no one cares anymore? There are occasional gems that slip out, don't get me wrong. And we've all seen at least some of the movies that mine this material, and feed the even bigger entertainment machine. But we've also increasingly seen movies that you may or may not know where inspired by a comic book NOT from the big two. Especially in the age of streaming services. So many comics are finding their way to the screen that don't feature characters that we know. That's a different kind of creative lazy shorthand of course. TV and movie writers looking to comics for inspiration/properties. But that's really always been the way, right? Before comics, there were those boring books, etc. Sorry, I'm just rambling along. But yeah, comics. They'll still exist. But they may not even resemble what we remember. They'll move on, and leave us all behind eventually.

Looks like a printed book plate to me, based on the printed text at the bottom. That said, printing screens didn't get really good until after the year 2000 or so. I can't see a dot screen, but it's a small pic. I'd have to see a super closeup to confirm it's original. But that printed text at the bottom is very weird. Anyhow, parts of it look like pencil and parts look like ink wash. As for value... whatever you can get someone to pay you for them, as with anything else. Absent knowing where they were used and how, they are simply unattributed drawings. This is were the old monetary value is almost always tied to something. Be it the artist's name, the book the work was done for, the reach that the image has had, etc. and so on. Without having any of that... To someone into landed gentry style hunting, steeplechase, horses, even maybe hunting dogs, they might have some value. I've seen framed stuff like this in antique stores sit for $100-300 for years and years. It's all about getting eyes on it and letting the market set itself. If you can find the source of publication, if any (family, asking around groups for which this type of material might be familiar), maybe you get lucky and it's from something people have heard of? Or you find out what it is, and discover it's from some book no one even cares about any more, and your parents just fancied the drawings. Might have more value as keepsake than art find, really. If you ever get to go to a really large market in a very large old city (London, Paris, Rome) you can often find such drawings by the dozens or hundreds. Random scenes of life, etc. As an art subject it didn't really take off until the late 1800s/early 1900s, as before that, most art and drawings were made for the rich, and they didn't fancy seeing average people in their homes. Hah. My suspicion is that this was to illustrate a story or something. Could have been done as late as the 70s, but possibly before. If you know 100% for sure it is really original art, and not printed, you should directly ask Mitch at Graphic Collectibles, as he's sold a fair amount of illustration art over the years. You could hit up any folks that specialize in selling illustration art to see if they recognize the style, or the style that this drawing might be aping. And you could reach out to David Apatow via his Illustration Art blog, and see if he has any thoughts. he's written several books on illustrators, and pays attention to a lot of it. He might be gracious enough to give you his .02¢. http://illustrationart.blogspot.com/ There are also Illustration Art groups on Facebook. You could post them there and ask if anyone has any thoughts on where to look. At the end of the day, my recommendation is to not get your hopes up, be methodical. Take your time. Figure out what you do and or don't have. But ONLY if it's worth your time and you have a genuine curiosity. Otherwise, chances are it is a big waste of time and not worth the hours of work you'll put into it to find out it's gonna net you $45 on eBay. people talk all the time about barn finds. Attic finds, etc. Hitting the mother lode as it were. But that only works best if you know what you have. Knowledge is almost 9/10s of value in a case like this. Good luck.

WTF?!?

What? Artwork comes with paperwork and certificates? What the heck have I been buying?

I was curious and Googled... hit on this 6 year old thread. https://www.blackhatworld.com/seo/looking-for-a-bot-add-to-cart-checkout-bot-for-art-drops.675163/

Flippers gonna flip, but I don’t think there’s much to show anybody is buying from someone like Felix’s drops with an eye towards making a buck. I think Felix tends to price pretty close to market anyhow. Which isn’t to say people don’t buy multiple pages when they have an opportunity. But if his guys are always selling out all the time, it might become an eventuality (flippers). But all hypothetical blah blah blah at this point.

Not just toy guys. The art poster collectors over on Expresso Beans complain about bots all the time. They seem to be becoming a way of life for the Uber quick-draw drop of very finite items online. Not sure how it’d work with an OA drop tho. Unless you are the kind of buyer willing to take anything on the table. I mean posters, toys, shoes. When a limited one drops, it’s a “lot” of the same thing. With art all one of a kind... I wouldn’t ever understand buying just anything for the sake of getting something, but maybe others would? https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.com/news/amp/business-49283059

Amen to all that.

For real. Walk a bookstore and note how many covers of books and magazines are Photographic, or design oriented, or a heavy mix of Photoshop collage with digitally painted in elements. More and more the places that still do real art on the covers are increasingly becoming boutique publishers. So much of everything else is whatever can be made faster = cheaper. Often with less care, creativity or forethought. Look at the modern day movie poster for a great example.

I was just teasing. I respect McFarlane on several levels. I have issues with his art as well, but in the end it was a cheap but funny shot.