RBerman

On 5/17/2024 at 8:57 AM, Dmit317 said:

Those prices you are seeing the auctions went for aren't the actual Commissions. These auctions were just to get a Spot. You still pay full Commission Price. 

 

Isn't Lake Como a really small Con? Like only 1500 people attend. My assumption for it has been that it's so small it's not as hard to get Commissions as others. 

I am curious if the artists are discounting the guaranteed Commission the amount the auction went for. Multiple went for $75+ bucks.

It is a small con, but for artists spending a lot of time on the work, thy won't be doing many. For instance IIRC, Milo Manara only took one commission there last year, a painted head sketch.

On 5/14/2024 at 2:03 PM, alxjhnsn said:

Clever! Was it your idea? Should be an interesting venture!

This was done on a small scale for a couple of artists last year. I can see it becoming a thing, since it's basically an opportunity for the artists to let the market ensure that their commission fee is high enough.

On 5/12/2024 at 11:25 AM, PhilipB2k17 said:

I expect it’s not going to be an annual trip for me either. I’m just hoping the weather forecast improves. Right now it’s predicting rain the whole time we’re there. 

If last year is any indication, it will rain a little bit each day. It is a very green area due to the combination of mountains and lakes. My art was never in jeopardy, but I did bring a bunch of garbage bags in which to shroud my portfolios just in case.

I had a great time last year meeting the likes of Manara, Liberatore, McKean, Dodson, Moore, and Comolo, but there are diminishing returns, and it is expensive, so we're not going this time. I suspect we'll be back in the future when my wife gets a hankering to spend a weekend in the beautiful lakeside environment.

On 5/7/2024 at 5:19 PM, Rick2you2 said:

I used it recently in a matter, and it seems to be very accurate for concepts. It may be less good when it comes to shading or amplifying different emotional responses (e.g., a home is more than just a lived-in house)(“Avengers Form a Group!”).

Yes, and it often requires corrections of pronoun gender when the individual sentence doesn't provide enough context. It's a tool but not a panacea.

On 4/5/2024 at 6:06 AM, Rick2you2 said:

He has a number of different styles. His Torpedo, which I love, has a “film noir” feel to it. He has a beloved character, Clara, the prostitute, done in a light, humorous style. He has a more serious style in Cicca, an earlier series, and some Jonah Hex pieces, as well as other art, usually in a dark style. None of them are particularly expensive from what I have seen. He also does commissions. I just wish I understood the  language.

Thanks to Google Translate, I don’t worry about that any more. I choose pages for the art and then plug in the text to find out the dialogue.

The provenance of legitimate but unpublished sketches can be very difficult to prove. These types of works are the most easily forged, so prospective buyers like to see the sort of evidence that can be challenging to acquire after the original owner has passed on.

I sent Glen a message about this.

Could be an honest mistake if Cockrum did ink the other three issues of this mini. Cockrum is listed as the inker here: https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Nightcrawler_Vol_1_4. But the title page does list Rubinstein as "finisher." I reached out to Joe and will post update if he responds.

On 4/20/2024 at 12:42 PM, MichaelM said:

Anyone happen to know if he's done another since?  I'd love to get an opportunity to get something of his.

I believe he is still working through the previous list. I was on it and got this Captain Raader piece.

On 4/15/2024 at 10:19 AM, Kevn said:

I think you make some great points, but one thing that bothers me about your Wiacek X-Men portrait is that it is 'signed' by both Wiacek and Smith, and the Smith signature is very much in his authentic signing style. Yes, there are dates with the signatures, but to me having the piece apparently signed by someone who didn't touch the page is potentially misleading. I've seen artists sign such pieces with something like "Wiacek '16" and, immediately below write "after Paul Smith '97" without imitating the original artist's signature. An artist's signature is the gold standard for provenance, and imitating it could confuse someone down the road, or be used by an unscrupulous seller. 

Yes, I can understand that point of view.

If nothing else, this all teaches me to buy the prelims whenever I get a commission. I have a Bob Wiacek X-Men ink portrait which was copied off a Paul Smith pencil original from 20 years prior. 

https://www.comicartfans.com/gallerypiece.asp?piece=1678284

I have a little heartburn listing it on CAF as “Paul Smith, penciler”, though in modern times it has become standard for pencils and inks to live separate collecting lives. It would be good for CAF to add a creator category to differentiate “pencils underneath the inks” vs “penciled on a separate page,” but I do not know how to succinctly state the difference for such a purpose. My solution is just to explain all this more verbosely in the item description. Here is another example for which the published comic credits George Perez with breakdowns but Nicola Scott with the pencils which I own.

https://www.comicartfans.com/GalleryPiece.asp?Piece=1820328

I likewise have some recreations of work by Frazetta and Perez, whom I credited with “layouts” on CAF but then explained that they never actually touched these pages. This seemed the best way to be transparent.

I recently visited the Rodin museum in Paris, and the audio guide would say things like “This statue of a wounded soldier was based on the figure of Christ in a Pieta by Michaelangelo,” so the complexity of attribution we face today does have precedent throughout art history.

if I had a prelim of someone else’s finished piece, I would link to its CAF page on mine.

On 3/31/2024 at 12:09 PM, Rick2you2 said:

In my case, there was never a lot it, and what there was of major artists, I already have representative samples of almost all of them. For example, I really don’t need an Aparo cover; I have 3 panel pages, and a fanzine cover. But, why I can’t find images of PS from Impulse? Captain Adam (missed one, once)? When they have slipped through, it’s usually because I already spent my spare cash on something else, or really don’t care for the image. And then I live to regret it for years. 

And by the way, I do buy outside my area on occasion. I commissioned Keith Williams for a Martian Manhunter piece I am waiting for, and I am just barely resisting the urge to buy some Jordi Bernet art. He is really terrific.

That is the third time Jordi Bernet has come up for me in 24 hours! I will have to check him out.

On 3/27/2024 at 8:45 AM, Xatari said:

eBay honestly has the best fee structure on higher end art but just doesn’t seem to get the eyeballs or sales. It’s too bad. 

It murdered its own potential by allowing fakery to thrive and failing adequately to segregate published published comic art from either prints or the ocean of cheesecake cartoons.

On 3/27/2024 at 8:39 AM, alxjhnsn said:

Amazon has the Epson Workforce Pro WF-7820 on sale for $180. That’s a good deal.

That is a good price. Epson expects to make its money on expensive ink refills, but if you use the device mainly for scanning, that doesn't cost a dime extra. It says the printer goes up to 13x19. Is the scanner that large as well?

I don't live there but will be visiting family for a few days around Christmas. If you're around then, talk with Alex and maybe we can meet up.

I see no image.

The market has simply increased in value in recent years, so sticker shock is understandable for those who remember cheaper days. And yes, some of it is the add-on costs of the online auction process. But another thing that keeps bids high is anonymous bidding. Collectors like to be on good terms with their peers so they can enjoy each other's collections. If we were all in a room together (as indeed happens at places like the OAX auction and the Heroes Con auction), there's at least some incentive to compete less fiercely against each other and just congratulate the other guy on his new art. Not that Heritage is immune to collusive "gentlemen's agreements" among high-end buyers who like the same pieces. But it takes more work.

On 2/14/2024 at 11:34 AM, NicoV said:

I see 54 items in the comic art section: https://comics.ha.com/c/search/results.zx?term=&dept=1938&auction_name=7364&mode=live&comic_category=3242

Ah, I must have clicked on a link that selected only the Gaiman- related items.

A Heritage Auction with nine items in it? Unusual.

On 2/8/2024 at 10:58 PM, mtlevy1 said:

The lady in yellow pants is....Everett!

He looks better in yellow than one might have expected.

On 2/9/2024 at 7:54 AM, John E. said:

I think of this celebration within the community as the “Best Post of the Year” more than “Best Acquisition.”

Exactly. Why do I care whether you acquired the piece yesterday or ten years ago? The point is that you posted it on CAF last year for others to enjoy, and the awards are an opportunity to celebrate (and incentivize) that behavior.

On 2/8/2024 at 8:39 AM, PhilipB2k17 said:

I knew that. But it seems like some of the pieces being posted were not actually acquired during the past year, but only added to CAF. I don't know how you could police that in any case. I only submitted pieces that I had acquired during the year. 

It doesn't matter when you acquired the piece, only when you posted it on CAF. The process of submitting your pieces for consideration automatically locks out pieces submitted in other years. Lots of people have probably had art for a while before uploading it to CAF.