Nov Heritage auction

[Nexus]

Honestly, I thought that the JIM 88 panel pages went for some very reasonable prices, considering the prices put on a lot of his 70's work of D list characters. I always assumed Kirby's Thor from JIM were way out of reach (for me at least), but maybe thats not the case.

 

 

For anyone who ever wanted a nice representative Kirby Thor page...this was the auction. So many nice examples. Almost too many...I'd like one, but just couldn't choose!

[mtlevy]

I didn't feel the Kirby market was weak but perhaps thats because the Thor page I wanted went higher than I expected

[jjonahjameson1]

Honestly, I thought that the JIM 88 panel pages went for some very reasonable prices, considering the prices put on a lot of his 70's work of D list characters. I always assumed Kirby's Thor from JIM were way out of reach (for me at least), but maybe thats not the case.

 

 

For anyone who ever wanted a nice representative Kirby Thor page...this was the auction. So many nice examples. Almost too many...I'd like one, but just couldn't choose!

 

The Clink JIM 112 page was really nice, but at $25K, I don't think it went cheap.

[chromium]

 

For anyone who ever wanted a nice representative Kirby Thor page...this was the auction. So many nice examples. Almost too many...I'd like one, but just couldn't choose!

 

The strange thing was that the all the pieces went for very similar prices but some pages were a lot better than the others and still there wasn't a big price discrepancy, so I'm thinking most of them were bought by a single buyer.

[artdealer]

 

For anyone who ever wanted a nice representative Kirby Thor page...this was the auction. So many nice examples. Almost too many...I'd like one, but just couldn't choose!

 

The strange thing was that the all the pieces went for very similar prices but some pages were a lot better than the others and still there wasn't a big price discrepancy, so I'm thinking most of them were bought by a single buyer.

 

You'll know which dealers bought them as soon as they start posting the art on CAF, charging 2-3 times more than they paid.

 

MI

[WYLDCHYLD]

The 2 Thor splashes were both REALLY beautiful...I mean, you seriously couldn't ask for nicer examples.

I really was surprised they didn't hit a bit higher though...

 

The #88 with Loki was REALLY beautiful, (even though Ayers inks make him seem a bit more "feminine" than Chic Stone's). Big figures of both Thor and Loki...very nice, very early...Thor swinging his hammer...yes please.

 

The #110 had GREAT inks on it, and Thor was a nice huge posed image and had nice detailed backgrounds, a cool story title, and even images of the villains (stats, but still darn cool). Again, yes please.

 

I really could've seen them going for more...

 

The X-Men #137 page (I used to own this one) went for some serious money...wayyyy more than I thought it would ever go for, but that being said, c'mon, you couldn't ask for a better example page from this ENTIRE storyline.

Very classic, very well drawn, VERY VERY VERY memorable...

I'll always miss this page from my collection. It is simply the very BEST quality.

 

A little more surprised on the Cockrum X-Men #104 page that sold. It's very nice and of course Magneto is a real treat, but I didn't expect it to hit what it did. Either way, another nice example as you can rarely go wrong with X-Men #94-142 pages when it comes to comics at their finest high-water mark in terms of both art and story.

 

I also want to point out that the 2 Byrne Captain America covers were WELL worth what they sold for...both are beautiful...I mean REALLY beautiful...

The 249 is a personal favorite and is stunning in person.

The 253 has a smaller image of Cap, yes, but c'mon, who DOESN'T remember this story with Baron Blood...

Ah yes...back when Byrne was really at his peak...EXCELLENT STUFF.

 

Congrats to all the new owners of these cool pieces!

[drewincanada]

 

For anyone who ever wanted a nice representative Kirby Thor page...this was the auction. So many nice examples. Almost too many...I'd like one, but just couldn't choose!

 

The strange thing was that the all the pieces went for very similar prices but some pages were a lot better than the others and still there wasn't a big price discrepancy, so I'm thinking most of them were bought by a single buyer.

 

Just before I read you post I was about to comment that there was a fairly big discrepancy in the prices for those #88 pages.

 

The panel pages with Thor in them - and especially the ones with him transforming from Blake - went for $6-9K. The pages without Thor went for less than half that - even the pages that featured Loki.

 

Many of the pages were just OK, IMHO, and I think that $3,500 or so for an average non-Thor JIM page is still fairly strong. Likewise, $7, 8 and 9K for a decent JIM page with Thor.

[chromium]

 

For anyone who ever wanted a nice representative Kirby Thor page...this was the auction. So many nice examples. Almost too many...I'd like one, but just couldn't choose!

 

The strange thing was that the all the pieces went for very similar prices but some pages were a lot better than the others and still there wasn't a big price discrepancy, so I'm thinking most of them were bought by a single buyer.

 

Just before I read you post I was about to comment that there was a fairly big discrepancy in the prices for those #88 pages.

 

The panel pages with Thor in them - and especially the ones with him transforming from Blake - went for $6-9K. The pages without Thor went for less than half that - even the pages that featured Loki.

 

Many of the pages were just OK, IMHO, and I think that $3,500 or so for an average non-Thor JIM page is still fairly strong. Likewise, $7, 8 and 9K for a decent JIM page with Thor.

 

Really ?

 

I was only looking at the pages that featured Thor, so I was totally clueless about the lower end pages.

 

I bid on 9 (Thor) pages , (prices without BP to make it easier to look up for me)

3 sold for $5000 - $5500

2 for $6500

3 for $7000 - $8000

 

I though pages #3, # & #11 were much nicer than all the rest, yet they only sold for a few thousand dollars more.

 

[mtlevy]

I thought prices of Jim pages ok given sold the entire story at once...only many folks throw down $$ on a page. I imagine they may sell a bit higher when they turn up again. One nice thing about the hobby is not everyone sees the same best page in this case...and how much better is ...even tougher....hope u got 3 or 11

 

[mtlevy]

I thought prices of Jim pages ok given sold the entire story at once...only many folks throw down $$ on a page. I imagine they may sell a bit higher when they turn up again. One nice thing about the hobby is not everyone sees the same best page in this case...and how much better is ...even tougher....hope u got 3 or 11

 

[AKA Rick]

Here's the breakdown of the JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY #88 Issue as it sold on Heritage (not including the rougnly 30% extra to cover the buyers premium, taxes and shipping):

 

Pg 1 (splash) = $40,000 - 1st page and app of Loki

 

Pg 2 = $6,000 - Thor transforms to Donald Blake; 1st App of Loki in the context of the story.

 

Pg 3 = $6,500 - Donald Blake transforms to Thor

 

Pg 4 = $5,000 - Donald Blake transforms to Thor by hitting his cane. Thor in costume. Jane Foster. Loki. I think this is actually one of the best pages, yet it went for the lower average on the "transformation" pages

 

Pg 5 = $7,000 - good dialogue, but nothing special

 

Pg 6 = $7,500 - Nice 1st panel of Thor saying "...the invincible hammer of Thor!"

 

Pg 7 = $5,500 - Thor transforms to Donald Blake

 

Pg 8 - $2,800 - Donald Blake & Jane Foster + Loki, No Thor in costume.

 

Pg 9 - $3,000 - Loki only. No Thor or Donald Blake. The worst of all pages.

 

Pg 10 - $2,600 - Great 1st panel. Donald Blake, Jane Foster and Loki.

 

Pg 11 - $8,000 - Donald Blake transforms to Thor - by touching the Hammer, not banging the stick, so not as iconic as Page #4

 

Pg 12 - $6,500 - Thor in every panel

 

Pg 13 - $5,000 - End Page. Thor and Loki.

 

The THOR #172 (1969) Page #2 featured a Kirby/Everett "Transformation" of Thor to Donald Blake, by banging the hammer's handle, and that went for $6,000.

 

So, the prices varied. If I had the money, I'd probably have bought the JIM #88 Page #4 and the THOR #172 Page #4, so it shows both sides of the transformation and the best depiction to the origin of Thor and how his powers works... but that's $11,000 plus the fees, so would be about $14,000 for the paid. Great sequence 'tho!

 

I wonder, if the seller was better off: 1) selling the book as separate pages all at once during the same auction VS... 2) selling the entire book at one complete set ('tho the sum would be over $100k, which is hard for any one individual to pony up)... or, which I would probably think would be the best, sell off 1 page at a time, to not flood the market and maximize the revenue.

 

I guess an unknown factor is the question, did the seller need to raise money right away, so time was of essence.

 

If not, I'd think selling all 13 pages gives too many collectors too many options, so for a person who wants one piece, if they lose one auction, there's another one to fall back on, and buyers start to prioritize which they're going to go after with more vigor and which are their "plan B" alternative choices.

 

I think the psychology of selling lends itself to giving the illusion of scarcity.

 

I find it odd when a seller at a convention puts out a stack of multiples of the same comic book, which almost tells the buyer... "no need to make a decision now, there's a lot here waiting for you" as well as "i'm potentially negotiable" - - whereas, when a person only sees one of the items, they're more prone to react impulsively not wanting to miss out, so makes decisions sometimes in haste, to the benefit of the seller.

 

I think the X-Men #1 book was broken up in small lots, still not one page at a time, but over the course of several auctions.

 

I'd also figure, if a person wanted to compile the book it allows them to "recover" financially and bid on 'em, plus, if there were less pages where the demand is greater than the supply, naturally, I'd imagine prices would go higher for each and every piece.

 

 

 

For anyone who ever wanted a nice representative Kirby Thor page...this was the auction. So many nice examples. Almost too many...I'd like one, but just couldn't choose!

 

The strange thing was that the all the pieces went for very similar prices but some pages were a lot better than the others and still there wasn't a big price discrepancy, so I'm thinking most of them were bought by a single buyer.

 

Just before I read you post I was about to comment that there was a fairly big discrepancy in the prices for those #88 pages.

 

The panel pages with Thor in them - and especially the ones with him transforming from Blake - went for $6-9K. The pages without Thor went for less than half that - even the pages that featured Loki.

 

Many of the pages were just OK, IMHO, and I think that $3,500 or so for an average non-Thor JIM page is still fairly strong. Likewise, $7, 8 and 9K for a decent JIM page with Thor.

 

Really ?

 

I was only looking at the pages that featured Thor, so I was totally clueless about the lower end pages.

 

I bid on 9 (Thor) pages , (prices without BP to make it easier to look up for me)

3 sold for $5000 - $5500

2 for $6500

3 for $7000 - $8000

 

I though pages #3, # & #11 were much nicer than all the rest, yet they only sold for a few thousand dollars more.

[mtlevy]

So quiet transformation page or a battle page...which is "better"....

[blowout]

So quiet transformation page or a battle page...which is "better"....

 

Has to be a battle page every time. Unless we are talking the 'first ever' tranformation page.

[blizzardtonight]

does anyone know who won the cardy superman cover or maybe can the current owner contact me privately in case he is a list member?

thanks for your help!

guenter

 

 

[Mephisto]

So quiet transformation page or a battle page...which is "better"....

 

Has to be a battle page every time. Unless we are talking the 'first ever' tranformation page.

 

Thor is a real gender bender.

[delekkerste]

X-Men #137 page - $65,725

 

John Byrne responding to this sale:

 

That's more than three complete issues, pencils, inks, -script, that the buyer could have commissioned me to do. Original. Just for him/her.

 

Byrne then responds to this comment:

 

"I don't see a problem with this at all. It just proves the John Byrne is one of the great comic book artists, and will go down in history as such. What is wrong with that?"

 

Is that really what it proves, tho? Recently, a Frank Miller page from DKR sold for close to half a million dollars. Should we infer from this that Frank is seven and a half times greater than I? That his contribution to the field is that much greater than mine?

 

Similarly, the price tag on my page is in the same stratospheric regions as prices I see for Jack Kirby originals. Is my place on the comicbook Olympus equal to Jack's?

 

Sadly, what this really shows is that the same kind of madness which infected comics is now infecting comicbook art. And, as it did in comics, this madness is likely to seal out the people without the big bucks to spend. A hobby is becoming a business, which is the fastest way I know to self destruct.

 

(And wait for it! A year, or two years, or five years from now, when the buyer tries to sell this piece and cannot get anything like the price s/he paid, because the market has shifted to Paul Smith's work, or someone else later than me --- well, then we can expect to be told "Byrne's stuff doesn't sell anymore.")

 

Y'know, whoever was doing the purchasing, I would draw some small solace if I thought the motivation was, indeed, that the pieces are "cool to own". But I fear that once we enter this level of spending (half a million for ONE PAGE??) we are talking about Art-as-Commodity.

 

I don't imagine the owners of these works standing in front of them, as I sometimes do with pieces on my studio walls and, at least metaphorically, dancing a little jog and chirping This Is So Cool!!!

 

I imagine the pieces in a safe deposit box, locked away like jewels or gold bullion, changing owners without said owners ever looking at anything but the money made.

 

When civilians find out I have a comicbook collection, their first questions are "What's the oldest comic you have?" and "What's the most valuable comic you have?" Not necessarily in that order.

 

The walls of my Studio are covered with what has been called a "breathtaking" collection of original art. No civilian has ever asked me the "worth" of a piece. Most of the time, in fact, they don't even grasp that these are pieces of ORIGINAL ART. In their minds, the only thing comics exist for is to be valuable investments, and then only as comic books.

 

But with these kinds of insane numbers for art, how long before that changes? All it took to create the "investment" mentality in comicbook collecting was a single article in The Wall Street Journal circa 1978, that reported old comics showed a greater return on the "investment" than GOLD. This because an copy of MARVEL COMICS 1 had sold for $20,000. Quite the return on that 10¢ cover price.

 

Except, of course, the seller hadn't paid 10¢. But the damage was done. And now comics that once sold for a nickel in back issue boxes in second hand bookstores are priced far, far, far beyond the reach of average collectors.

 

And, as I have mentioned before, the level of insanity when it crosses into original art collection is the same. Even the language is the same. I once saw a book listing prices for original art that described some pieces as RARE.

 

The Mona Lisa and a page of Rob Liefeld's YOUNGBLOOD are equally RARE. For each piece, their is only one

[delekkerste]

And a comment from the underbidder of the page who posted on the Byrne Robotics message board:

 

Hi all...coming out of lurk mode to add my 65,725 cents...

 

I was the underbidder on this page.

 

People tend to pigeonhole a person's motivations for doing something outside the norm...in this case bidding more than expected amount of money for a page of comic art. Although I can't speak for my competitor who won the page, I had several reasons for bidding that high....but I don't think 'status' would be up on that list...as I'm sure most of you will attest to the fact that you've never even heard of me.

 

Although this is the penultimate page of the death of Phoenix...and not a splash and not a cover...for me that didn't matter...this page was the best page of the book, if not the whole run. The emotion portrayed in her face in the 2nd and the last panels is unmatched....exhaustion, surprise, sadnesss, realization/revelation---then to fear, desperation and loss of self-control. Without even reading the words...those two panels essentially tell the whole story of her descent.

 

So for me it really wasn't so much status...nor a commodity to profit from. Rather it's an awesome piece of artwork from the main title I collected as a kid...and I figured it was my only opportunity to ever buy it.

 

I have always wanted a page from 137...and this was the one page in 137 that I was willing to 'sell the farm' for...unfortunately my farm wasn't worth enough.

 

BTW....I would not expect the prices of pages from your run on X-men to drop anytime soon...at least not until the people that collected the book when they were kids get older and die off in 40-50 years or so. The collecting bug + a little nostalgia is a huge driving force for many people to empty their wallets (including myself!). Later artists (or the latest 'hot' artist) will never carry the same nostalgic weight...

 

Thanks for reading!

 

-Will

[bocaratondefense]

X-Men #137 page - $65,725

 

John Byrne responding to this sale:

 

That's more than three complete issues, pencils, inks, -script, that the buyer could have commissioned me to do. Original. Just for him/her.

 

Byrne then responds to this comment:

 

"I don't see a problem with this at all. It just proves the John Byrne is one of the great comic book artists, and will go down in history as such. What is wrong with that?"

 

Is that really what it proves, tho? Recently, a Frank Miller page from DKR sold for close to half a million dollars. Should we infer from this that Frank is seven and a half times greater than I? That his contribution to the field is that much greater than mine?

 

Similarly, the price tag on my page is in the same stratospheric regions as prices I see for Jack Kirby originals. Is my place on the comicbook Olympus equal to Jack's?

 

 

Obviously rhetorical questions by John Byrne, but I do appreciate John's take on the comic art hobby.

 

 

 

 

[heartened]

X-Men #137 page - $65,725

 

John Byrne responding to this sale:

 

That's more than three complete issues, pencils, inks, -script, that the buyer could have commissioned me to do. Original. Just for him/her.

 

Byrne then responds to this comment:

 

"I don't see a problem with this at all. It just proves the John Byrne is one of the great comic book artists, and will go down in history as such. What is wrong with that?"

 

Is that really what it proves, tho? Recently, a Frank Miller page from DKR sold for close to half a million dollars. Should we infer from this that Frank is seven and a half times greater than I? That his contribution to the field is that much greater than mine?

 

Similarly, the price tag on my page is in the same stratospheric regions as prices I see for Jack Kirby originals. Is my place on the comicbook Olympus equal to Jack's?

 

 

Obviously rhetorical questions by John Byrne, but I do appreciate John's take on the comic art hobby.

 

 

 

 

I don't know why artists seem to persist on this fantasy that just because we liked their art on a particular issue during a particular time in the hobby (and in our youth, most typically), that we'd even consider buying something from the same artist drawn today. Artists, I can understand, always feel like they are improving their craft and skill, but time and again there is an obvious disconnect between what an artist feels is his "best" work and what the hobby considers as such.

 

As for the other rhetorical questions, they are just that. You can't compare prices realized on Kirby vs. Miller vs. Byrne without comparing/contrasting the collector base as well, which is oftentimes vastly different. Yes, in the hobby overall (and as historry might put it), Kirby is more "important" and therefore perhaps more valuable than the other two, but to the individual collector all that matters little if they happened to not like Kirby's style.

 

For my two cents, I thought the sale was well out of the realm of what anyone even considered as "market", perhaps even double what people would have guessed. However, clearly it took two to tango and at least two people felt this was worth the price. And, contrary to what Byrne thought, it does indeed sound like the owner (or atleast the runner-up) would certainly have stood before it to "do a jig and say 'how cool is this?!'". Thus, this was not art as a commodity or investment, it was pure heated passion for a particular page from a particular book. Nothing screams collector and hobbyist (over investor) more than that.

 

[Bronty]

X-Men #137 page - $65,725

 

John Byrne responding to this sale:

 

That's more than three complete issues, pencils, inks, -script, that the buyer could have commissioned me to do. Original. Just for him/her.

 

Byrne then responds to this comment:

 

"I don't see a problem with this at all. It just proves the John Byrne is one of the great comic book artists, and will go down in history as such. What is wrong with that?"

 

Is that really what it proves, tho? Recently, a Frank Miller page from DKR sold for close to half a million dollars. Should we infer from this that Frank is seven and a half times greater than I? That his contribution to the field is that much greater than mine?

 

Similarly, the price tag on my page is in the same stratospheric regions as prices I see for Jack Kirby originals. Is my place on the comicbook Olympus equal to Jack's?

 

 

Obviously rhetorical questions by John Byrne, but I do appreciate John's take on the comic art hobby.

 

 

 

 

I don't know why artists seem to persist on this fantasy that just because we liked their art on a particular issue during a particular time in the hobby (and in our youth, most typically), that we'd even consider buying something from the same artist drawn today.

 

I totally agree Hari.

 

On the one hand I can understand why they think that. In pure art terms, what they are drawing today may or may not be as good as what they did then. If it is, then from one POV they have a point... in a sense. (double qualifier )

 

Of course, as has been stated many times there's a lot of other factors to valuation or even just appreciation than pure aesthetics which is what guys like Byrne don't take into account.

 

3 customs issues? I think of that as paying for three x 20 pages of something I don't want very badly. Not enticing.