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Lower Your Consideration...

Started by drdroom,

19 posts in this topic

thethedew

thethedew

Posted
Posted

I'm revealing myself as ignorant here, so be gentle- (Micronauts didn't cross over into Kirby territory)

 

Is everyone convinced that these are fakes? Sure, there are the usual warning signs - sketches rather than published art, non-US seller with laughable Ebay history trying to peddle what would normally be reasonably desirable art... :blahblah:

 

But to my untrained-Kirby-eyes, these look pretty close to me. (shrug)

Can someone push along my education? (worship)

 

Thanks,

Andrew

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thethedew

thethedew

Posted
Posted

Also agreed that's a Red Flag. But I was hoping for more of an art critique' viewpoint, but maybe this isn't the forum for that.

 

If this guy isn't lightboxing/copying a Kirby original, then he seems to be doing a pretty good job of doing it in Kirby's style. If he keeps practicing he'll get better. Dangerous for our hobby.

:tonofbricks:

 

Ultimately, I guess I'm lucky I'm not in the market for Kirby stuff!

 

(A glance at his 'other items' has just as much comedy as the 'Kirby')

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Speedy-D

Speedy-D

Posted
Posted

I know what you mean. It's especially dangerous with someone as stylized as Kirby. You can do a pretty awful drawing and throw in enough Kirby-type lines to make it obvious what you're going for.

 

In general, it's a lot easier to ape an artist's style than you might assume. On the one hand, this is a bummer as it makes it easier to crank out forgeries, and the more of them you see the more you might start to think that the original artist isn't actually all that. On the other hand, when you revisit the original work, you realize that what makes them special isn't the tricks anyone can copy, it's the intangibles that are so hard to define, but easy to spot when they're not there if you know what i mean.

 

For this guy specifically, as I said before his Green Arrow is his best forgery. Even so, many of the lines are super tentative. One thing Kirby had going for him was incredibly strong lines. Looking at his art, even the later stuff, you can tell that he had full confidence in himself, and would just jump right in and draw. And while he wasn't hung up on proper anatomy, he could follow it when it suited him, and when he didn't he had his own anatomy that you can see again and again. This stuff just looks wrong, without being Kirby's version of right.

 

But don't discount my last post. There are a lot of shady people who are a lot better than this guy. When you run into them, it's the way they sell that will often tip you off to potential skullduggery.

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Catwoman_Fan

Catwoman_Fan

Posted
Posted
I'm revealing myself as ignorant here, so be gentle- (Micronauts didn't cross over into Kirby territory)

 

Is everyone convinced that these are fakes? Sure, there are the usual warning signs - sketches rather than published art, non-US seller with laughable Ebay history trying to peddle what would normally be reasonably desirable art... :blahblah:

 

But to my untrained-Kirby-eyes, these look pretty close to me. (shrug)

Can someone push along my education? (worship)

 

Thanks,

Andrew

 

 

I recognize the Thor from CAF, it's a bad copy of this piece.

THOR

Also, Kirby never redrew the exact same pose. Similar, but not the same (he didn't lightbox himself). 2c

 

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Dave Aikins

Dave Aikins

Posted
Posted

That's right! It's a drawing that MIke Royer was hired to put together based on a drawing of Kirby's Bullseye.

 

That's awesome.

 

Okay, so how do you know when something is fake? When the image was created after the artist who "signed" the art died.

 

Plus...geez are these bad. Really really bad...

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AKA Rick

AKA Rick

Posted
Posted

This is part of the reason why "Commissions" and "Sketches" are a bit more volatile of a collectible which is harder to substantiate authenticity compared to published original art.

 

Granted, some original art can be forged, but not as easily, and there's usually some sort of historical provenance with a greater potential for a legitimate paper trail to authenticate.

 

It's funny to see collector's chase down commission drawings at absurd prices either at conventions where the standard now seems to be $100 for unknown artists and $300 for mid-level, then up from there, where at those same tables or through dealers, original published pages with more (sometimes better, othertimes maybe not as detailed) rendering, albeit not a full figure pin up, but in some cases you get multiple characters obviously with panel pages, and sometimes at a fraction of the price of these drawings, sketchs and commissions.

 

I still view commissions as a hobby of passion for collectors VS published art, more for both fans, collectors, but also better geared towards investors. It's the better place to put your original art money, in my opinion.

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Dave Aikins

Dave Aikins

Posted
Posted

"This is part of the reason why "Commissions" and "Sketches" are a bit more volatile of a collectible which is harder to substantiate authenticity compared to published original art."

 

Well, this example is a part of the reason only for blind people...or people who know nothing about the artist they think they are are buying.

If you think that horrible fakes have any effect on collecting...I'd hate to see what actual decent fakes would do.

 

You always have to be careful when an artist has a very rough, or simple, style when dealing especially with quick sketches or doodles (that are worth money). For more labored over commissions or sketches, if it looks good and it's a fake- then the forger is a damn good artist. There just aren't that many talented comic-art forgers out there....

 

If you want to bring up a problem with published art, how about this: you don't know if the artist credited to the art actually did the art. Many times other artists were called in to do favors or help out on a deadline. Or maybe the inker isn't who you think he is. For instance- many Man of Steel pages were drawn by Byrne, but not inked by Giordano (instead by Frank Mclaughlin). Artists that worked in studio settings were always helping each other out. Artists that had assistants or hired studio employees, etc, etc... So, it's still the published art, sure...but possibly done by a different person.

 

But really, this does come down to educating yourself about what you collect. So many collectors of comic book art don't stop and research what they are buying. It's a bit sad... Thankfully, the internet does allow for nice communication these days. So anyone with half a brain can at least ask for other's opinions.

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malvin

malvin

Posted
Posted

 

I just talked to an inker recently who told me he did (uncredited) inks on a book- the artist that took credit for his work is easily one of the top 5 most popular artists of the last quarter century and it was on a major title

 

That actually happens all the time. Lots of inkers have assistants, that fill in blacks and maybe do more. I was reading the art of Todd McFarlane book, and he actually inked one of the pages from Dark Knight Returns! Klaus Janson was dropping off the pages to his assistant and Todd was hanging out with him and helped out.

 

Malvin

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Dave Aikins

Dave Aikins

Posted
Posted

By no means the same as a forged piece, but as comic art tends to be worth more and more -often based on the artists involved, it's always worth considering that you don't always know who actually created the art...

 

BUT, if your main interest is that it's the actual page from an issue you love- than who cares?

 

I still don't see a huge trend of convincing commission forgeries. There has been some concern with older artist recreations with ghost artists and such (which would be similar to the problem of not knowing who's involved with a puplished page), but in those instances (like the Kirby recreations), there is no actual proof as the "real" artist was still involved.

 

For the ebay forgeries, it seems to be a lot of rough sketches, quick sketches, simple sketches. Often times, these aren't good enough to fool most collectors.

Not too threatening to the art-collecting world. If you are concerned about getting scammed, just stay away from buying the type of art that can be easily forged.

 

Basically, if there's an artist out there who's good enough to create a convincing full-on commission forgery, well, you'd think they'd be making more money actually doing real work...

 

BTW, I have a huge stack of "real" Bruce Timm headshots doodles, if anyone wants one for really cheap...

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