Questions from a new guy

[Kevn]

New to this forum, though not to collecting OA, and I have a few questions for you folks. First, let me say I've read though a handful of threads here and I think this is the right group to ask. I see some kindred spirits here, and I've enjoyed the knowledgeable and passionate discussions I've read so far. I started collecting original art as soon as I had a couple of quarters to rub together, well before the internet age, mostly via snail mail responses to hand written ads in the CBG. Eventually my comics collecting ceased, and after that my original art interests shifted to illustration, animation, etc. I've had most of my comic OA collection tucked away in a couple of portfolios for years, though my favorites have been framed on my walls. I went to a local comic convention this weekend, and as a favor to the organizer I brought some art to show off, and it both rekindled my interest in the art, and also made me realize how many nice pages I have tucked away that never see the light of day.

 

At this point, I doubt I'll start buying again -- I have too much art of a wide variety. But I'd love to scan and post some of my collection, for others to enjoy, and probably sell off some of the work that I'm less attached to. I've seen a few sites where people show their OA, and ComicArtFans looks like the best place. So my questions:

 

Is ComicArtFans the best place to post images of some of my collection, or are there other recommended sites?

 

Any recommendations on the best places to sell a few pieces of OA (eBay vs CAF vs the markeplace here vs CLink vs HA vs ?)?

 

Is there a place here to show off one's collection?

 

My comic OA collection includes a lot of Colan Daredevil and Steve Rude Nexus pages, and a few by Kirby/Ditko/Romita/Kaluta/Mobieus, plus a few random pieces. I know the Rude pages haven't appreciated much, while I'm stunned at how valuable some of the others might be right now.

 

 

[zhamlau]

Good pages should go to Heritage or Comic Link. Displaying art really its only CAF like you said. Im sure you will get hammered with emails, I know personally Id love to see what Kaluta you had. But overall those are your two best bets for selling and for displaying.

[mister_not_so_nice]

Is ComicArtFans the best place to post images of some of my collection, or are there other recommended sites?

CAF it THE PLACE to post your OA. You could make your own website, but then no one would see it

 

Any recommendations on the best places to sell a few pieces of OA (eBay vs CAF vs the markeplace here vs CLink vs HA vs ?)?

 

From previous threads, I think the standard answer here is, "It depends"

There are so many variables the answer is going to vary based on exactly which page we are talking about.

 

Is there a place here to show off one's collection?

 

Sure, start a thread titled "Here is my collection" and post away

 

My comic OA collection includes a lot of Colan Daredevil and Steve Rude Nexus pages, and a few by Kirby/Ditko/Romita/Kaluta/Mobieus, plus a few random pieces. I know the Rude pages haven't appreciated much, while I'm stunned at how valuable some of the others might be right now.

 

and PMs asking for scans and prices (hoping you have no clue of the market) beginning in 3 . . . 2. . . 1. . . .

 

 

Mike

 

ps, PM sent

 

 

[Terry Doyle]

If you start receiving offers on anything, don't agree to anything you may want to sell until such time you've properly researched likely values.

[Eltanin]

If you start receiving offers on anything, don't agree to anything you may want to sell until such time you've properly researched likely values.

I completely agree.

You might think it is interesting to sell directly in order to avoid to pay fees to an auction house, but if you have been out of the hobby for a while, you might not know the best price for a piece, so it's probably safer to go with an auction house which will be able to sell at the market price.

Getting up-to-date with your pieces market values by yourself is doable, but will be a tedious enterprise.

 

CAF is clearly the best place where to show your collection, by far.

Since I see you have some Mœbius art, you might also consider http://www.2dgalleries.com/ : It's basically a european CAF and some people there would probably be happy to see your Mœbius pages. (If you consider selling some of the pages you have from him, it's also a way to reach new potential buyers).

[NicoV]

Is ComicArtFans the best place to post images of some of my collection, or are there other recommended sites?

CAF it THE PLACE to post your OA. You could make your own website, but then no one would see it

As you have Moebius pages (and the same stands for any other European artist) you can also create an account on 2dgalleries.com - it's a recent French website to display original art collections, but even if it's recent a lot of European collectors are on it. Of course you can also share your US artwork but you will have less people interested into them ;-)

[Bird]

well, I am not new to this forum but just learned about 2dgalleries.com ! So thanks guys.

 

I would love to see your Moebius pages and discuss possibly purchasing one (no interest in Blueberry for me though but just about anything else). There are some Moebius pieces in the Sotheby's auction coming up so you may be able to get a very limited sample of where the market is at currently. But if you have full size pages you are likely talking $10,000 range at minimum I think.

 

I would love to have a closet like that!

[NicoV]

There are some Moebius pieces in the Sotheby's auction coming up so you may be able to get a very limited sample of where the market is at currently. But if you have full size pages you are likely talking $10,000 range at minimum I think.

There are even more Moebius / Giraud pieces in the Christie's auction (the week after the Sotheby's auction). And yes $10k is really a minimum ...

[Kevn]

Thanks for all the replies, and for confirming much of what I'd suspected. I've definitely spent time recently checking values, and I've read most of the 40-page thread about current values of 'A' pages by various artists. I'm gratified that some of the art that I used to love, and that was really cheap back in the day, is being appreciated now. I've also registered at HA so I could see what pages there have been getting. And thanks for the rec about 2dgalleries.com. I'd just found that site yesterday, and definitely plan to put the Moebuis pages up there, too.

 

I'm in the fortunate position that I've done pretty good financial planning, so I don't need to sell anything, so I definitely won't be rushing into any deals. I used to be a pretty compulsive record keeper, and I just pulled out my 30+ year-old folder where I documented every single piece of OA I bought, where I got it, the asking price, what I paid, and so on. Plus I kept most of the ads from the CBG that spurred the purchases, as well as the correspondence with the dealers. I did pretty well for a kid living in the sticks, though it's hard not to look at those yellowed ads full of Kirby FF pages for under $200! I realized looking though that folder what I really want to do is engage with like-minded people about the stories behind the art, and do some mutual appreciating of these great, unde-rappreciated artists that were such a big part of our childhoods. Kind of like if you've ever gone to a hot rod or vintage car meet-up, where there's a little buying and selling, but mostly people kicking tires and admiring each others stuff and sharing stories.

 

I also realized last night that some of my holy grail pages, that I never got, still hold some allure for me. So maybe some trading is in my future. Anyway, hopefully I'll have the chance to do some scanning soon. I have a good scanner at work, though it's too big for the 2up pages that I'll need to just photograph I guess.

[Terry Doyle]

Looking forward to you sharing. (thumbs u

[Garf]

Looking forward to you sharing. (thumbs u

 

+1

 

Nice to see a thread like this and WTTB.

[Nexus]

WTTB! Good advice all around. Look forward to your CAF gallery!

[Eric Seffinga]

Heck yeah!

 

[glendgold]

Ah, CBG ads. When I got into collecting for the second time (1992) the local comic store got the CBG weekly, and every time I called an ad, the art was already sold. The store owner took pity on me and let me read the store's CBG, which was Fedexed instead of USPS-delivered, and which arrived two days beforehand. I managed to get art from the Kirbys once or twice. I still remember the feeling of seeing that newspaper and hoping there was an ad in there I hadn't seen before. Easily the best ad that ever appeared on my watch was Gene Colan, saying he would do commissions for $250. I sent him a fax, Adrienne faxed back, and I got my first commission, and started a friendship that lasted the rest of their days.

 

The internet made a lot better and easier but man the CBG was a great ritual.

 

G

[Terry Doyle]

Please also be advised that there's an Australian scam-artist named Richard Rae (frequenting these forums) who likes to trade his light-boxed artworks with unsuspecting collectors.

 

Should he approach you with offers of Jack Kirby and Jim Steranko illustrations, be warned they're not the real deal.

[Brian Peck]

And start running! Get as far away from him as possible.

[alxjhnsn]

My 2 cents:

 

Re: Is ComicArtFans the best place to post images of some of my collection, or are there other recommended sites?

ComicArtFans is the best place to show your art. It's easy to use, easy to find, and has a large audience (40K users). I would recommend a Premium membership to support the site though a free one works, too.

 

Re: Any recommendations on the best places to sell a few pieces of OA (eBay vs CAF vs the markeplace here vs CLink vs HA vs ?)?

 

The free way is to post the piece on the CAF and post notices on:

• the comicart-l mailing list and
  
• the CGC OA Marketplace.

While free and targeting an audience of serious collectors, they do not necessarily standout as an advertising POV.

 

The lowest selling price is eBay. The audience is large, but the OA section is filled with lots of junk - prints, amateur drawings, other trash. The signal to noise ratio is low, but ...

 

There are multiple auction houses. The big 3 for US sellers are:

• Heritage
• ComicLink
• Comic Connect

Heritage has the best publicity, but the highest fees. The seller will pay nearly 20% and the buyer's premium is nearly 20%. Of course, the seller's premium is negotiable. The other great feature of Heritage is its archive which I'll mention again below.The website is excellent.

 

ComicLink seems to be growing rapidly and does not have a buyer's premium. The website very nice to use, but lacks a few features that I'd like (lot tracking without bidding, an archive, and a few others).

 

ComicConnect is an outgrowth of Metropolis Collectibles. It's website is not very attractive and they put "collectibles" and OA in the same category. Still, it does allow version tracking.

 

 

Re: Is there a place here to show off one's collection?

You can attach image files to posts or post an image from another site. I usually show the thumbnail from the CAF and make it pickable to go to the CAF page. PM for details on the latter.

 

Re: Evaluating a Collection

Heritage is interested in providing this service for valuable collections if you are thinking of selling. I suspect that other auction houses might also be interested. Beyond that, I have this as my standard answer:

 

You might want to explore the following resources:

• The OA auction archive at Heritage Auctions - This archive presents the results from all of their OA auctions.. Once you sign-up and get an id, you can search for pieces by your artist and see what they have sold for.
  
• The CAF Market Data - More auction results (more than 1,000,000) are available if you join the Comic Art Fans site, pay for Market Data access, and access eBay and other auction sites as well as Heritage.
  
• The Comic Art Database. It contains transaction records entered by the owners of Comic OA.
• Dealer sites. Dealers, generally, post their art with fixed prices though there are exceptions. There is a list of dealers on CGC OA board and the Dragonberry site has a list as well. The CAF site will search the inventories of several dealers for you.
  
• Blouin Art Info which tracks sales at major art auctions. It can turn up some Comic OA as well. Look for the “Art Prices” item on the top right of the screen
  
• Jerry Weist's Comic Art Price Guide - Heritage published a third edition of it. In my opinion, it's a good history book and might be useful for comparison work, but it was out of date a year before it was printed.
  
• A topic on these CGC OA boards, A-level panel page valuations by artist/run - thoughts/additions/changes?, holds a discussion that relates to your question. It provides some "generally agreed upon" ranges for popular runs by popular artists on popular characters.
• The Biggest OA Prices thread tracked some of the largest sales in the OA space. While that particular thread has stopped; it's probably worth reading for the discussions. Meanwhile , the information is still being updated - just with a different mechanism.
  • The price information moved to The OA Elite blog. Click on the categories on the top of the page to see the updated list.
  • The discussion moved to Biggest OA Prices: The Blog

New buyers and sellers often find that OA is too hard to price. I agree. However, I think that there is a valid reason. Each piece is unique. Uniqueness make art sales generally and OA specifically non-linear.

 

For example,

• Consecutive pages could and do sell for radically different amounts.
  
• Take page layout - In general, you might say:
  Covers > 1st Page Splash > Other Splash > 1/2 splash > panel pages
  However, that's not always true either. The right panel page can be much more compelling than a bland splash.
  
• Take pencillers- There are "A-list" artists, but not all of their books/characters have the same value. Kirby FF pages generally go for more than JIM/Thor pages which go for more than Cap pages (2nd run) which go for more than ...
  
• Take combinations of pencilers/inkers - Kirby/Sinnott FF pages rank above Kirby and anyone else on FF, but a Kirby/X FF page might be more or less than a Kirby/Stone Thor page. Hard to tell.

 

Finally, you should join the comic book OA community. The three main points of Internet contact are:

• Yahoo's comicart-l mailing list
  
• The Comic Art Fans website
  
• The CGC OA Board

 

The main points of physical contact are probably:

• San Diego Comic Con
  
• New York City Comic Con
  
• Comic Art Con
  
• Heroes Comic Con

 

One last comment, if you are looking to buy or sell, spend the time to learn the market. That might take 6 months, but it's worth the time.

[Kevn]

@Glendgold, I used to use the fact that I got the CBG a couple of days later to my advantage. I figured any pages still available by the time I called the dealer could possibly be had at a discount. I also usually had to run down to the local comic store to look at back issues since I never became a monster collector of comic books, and I was sometimes interested in art from books I hadn't read. I used to use a similar strategy when I started going to SDCC. I would scope out pieces I might be interested in, and then on Sunday afternoon I'd make offers as the dealers were packing up. My thriftiness cost me a lot of premium pages, but I often ended up with nice pieces that I wouldn't have otherwise been able to afford. Of course, it's also why I never quite got the Ditko Spider-Man page I wanted...

 

@Alex, thank you for the incredibly comprehensive post! This would make a nice sticky post for new collectors, or for collectors who are new to this site. I'm curious about this part:

 

>>Heritage has the best publicity, but the highest fees. The seller will pay nearly 20% and the buyer's premium is nearly 20%. Of course, the seller's premium is negotiable.<<

 

I saw that there is a 19.5% buyer's premium, but I didn't realize there was also a seller's premium. So is Heritage getting close to 40% of these sales prices?!

[alxjhnsn]

>>Heritage has the best publicity, but the highest fees. The seller will pay nearly 20% and the buyer's premium is nearly 20%. Of course, the seller's premium is negotiable.<<

 

I saw that there is a 19.5% buyer's premium, but I didn't realize there was also a seller's premium. So is Heritage getting close to 40% of these sales prices?!

 

Yep. To be technical, if the final bid price is $100, they get $19.50 from the Seller (assuming there is no negotiation) and an additional $19.50 from the Buyer.

 

That works out as follows:

• Buyer bids $100.00
  
• Buyer pays $119.50
  
• Seller gets $81.50
  
• Heritage gets $39.00

So, Heritage gets 39% of the final bid price or $32.6% of what the Buyer paid.

 

However, they get a large audience of well heeled buyers so ...

 

 

[Weird Paper]

>>Heritage has the best publicity, but the highest fees. The seller will pay nearly 20% and the buyer's premium is nearly 20%. Of course, the seller's premium is negotiable.<<

 

I saw that there is a 19.5% buyer's premium, but I didn't realize there was also a seller's premium. So is Heritage getting close to 40% of these sales prices?!

 

Yep. To be technical, if the final bid price is $100, they get $19.50 from the Seller (assuming there is no negotiation) and an additional $19.50 from the Buyer.

 

That works out as follows:

• Buyer bids $100.00
  
• Buyer pays $119.50
  
• Seller gets $81.50
  
• Heritage gets $39.00

So, Heritage gets 39% of the final bid price or $32.6% of what the Buyer paid.

 

However, they get a large audience of well heeled buyers so ...

 

After he pays 28% capital gains on collectibles for taxes, seller nets as low as $59... about half of what buyer pays.