HA Wednesday auction 0

[lb jefferies]

On 9/9/2022 at 8:31 AM, comix4fun said:

There are a lot of new collectors who have entered the hobby more recently and active right now and bidding/spending well into five-figures, who don't care who the inker is on a piece, or don't know (in full) how variations in art teams and technique can create disparate outcomes. That just feels like a bad thing. 

This.

[grapeape]

When I started collecting artwork I made it my mission to see as many pieces of original art in person as I possibly could. To study them. To learn the different combinations of artists.

Credits be damned. Credits aren’t always accurate. When I look at a page I want to know who created it just by studying it.

So I had to deconstruct any laziness of accepting a listed credit for pencil or inked work and do more homework. Talk to artists, inkers, writers, long time collectors. Who actually did what in the pages. How much?

If you are buying a five figure + page today you should be able to visually inspect the art without credits and be able to tell with a great deal of certainty who the working artists were. That’s not a snob thing that’s a best practice.

Now as to who is great and who is a hack we’ll always agree to disagree.  I can tell you time has a way of changing perceptions in all fields of art.

Is there anyone else out there that remembers for example, Frank Giacoia being seen as “meh” because everything was compared to Sinnott over Kirby. Today collectors know and appreciate that Frank did dynamic work on quite a bit of quality covers and pages.

I think where a problem could come is if those wading in with large stacks of cash and buying based on a famous penciler’s name only, find out down the road that in a reset/recalibrated market the cream usually rises to the top. That Kirby Sinnott, Ditko-Ditko, Romita-Mooney or Romita-Romita are the gold standard and other combinations may not measure up in a beauty pageant or as a rising investment.

The good news is original art is fraught with irrationality. For everything we think we know there’s some outlier to make us clutch our pearls.

Some of the most beautiful art sells for far less than the pedestrian labored creations that hit the sweet tooth. 

I think it’s important to be educated about comic art. So if you buy Ditko-Bell you are aware that there exists an established opinion that Ditko-Ditko is superior but you happily bought opposite that opinion. The hobby is better if people are informed while spending their money.

[vodou]

All of the above, however many posts, nearly irrelevant now and absolutely completely irrelevant in no more six years.

[comix4fun]

On 9/9/2022 at 11:51 AM, grapeape said:

 

I think it’s important to be educated about comic art. So if you buy Ditko-Bell you are aware that there exists an established opinion that Ditko-Ditko is superior but you happily bought opposite that opinion. The hobby is better if people are informed while spending their money.

1,000%

[RBerman]

On 9/8/2022 at 10:03 AM, Will_K said:

That really surprised me.  And knowing there were more Terry strips to follow, I thought... "OK, here we go !!!".  The amazing thing was there was another Terry from less than a month later in 1935 that went for "only" $ 528.  That is a very wide range.  And several others in the later 1930's went for less than $1,000.

This shows that subject matter counts within the strip. Here's a $20,000 sale of a 1935 strip with tons of action:

Compared to a talky 1937 strip that sold for $550:

40x spread between the two prices! I'd also expect Dragon Lady to jack up the price, while the presence of the Asian stereotype character Connie likely makes some buyers uncomfortable.

[tth2]

On 9/10/2022 at 2:58 AM, RBerman said:

On 9/8/2022 at 11:03 PM, Will_K said:

That really surprised me.  And knowing there were more Terry strips to follow, I thought... "OK, here we go !!!".  The amazing thing was there was another Terry from less than a month later in 1935 that went for "only" $ 528.  That is a very wide range.  And several others in the later 1930's went for less than $1,000.

This shows that subject matter counts within the strip. Here's a $20,000 sale of a 1935 strip with tons of action:

Compared to a talky 1937 strip that sold for $550:

40x spread between the two prices! I'd also expect Dragon Lady to jack up the price, while the presence of the Asian stereotype character Connie likely makes some buyers uncomfortable.

A few years ago, the 1935 strip would've gone for much less, and the 1937 strip would've gone for a bit more.  The unending flood of strips coming from the Murphy collection has bifurcated the market as collectors have had to be choosier. 

I think these more "narrative" strips will be seen as bargains in the future, once the supply dwindles.  Particularly if they connect the sexier pieces and collectors start trying to put together complete storylines/sequences.  The art and storytelling, in and of themselves, are wonderful, particularly when Caniff was using his blue wash effect during the 1930s (which was done to tell the printers to put in grey tone).

[Xatari]

On 9/9/2022 at 10:20 AM, vodou said:

All of the above, however many posts, nearly irrelevant now and absolutely completely irrelevant in no more six years.

Couldn’t agree more. Love it or hate it, the hobby is not what it was 10 years ago. People will continue to look back on the past with rose colored glasses as is the case with most hobbies, but things change. That doesn’t make it better or worse, just different.

I’m glad some collectors appreciate different aspects of the hobby, but when it become a source or judgment of others, it gets trite. Similarly, I’m also glad there are new collectors finding enjoyment in things like NFTs. They aren’t my thing, but I’m not going to lord my own collection preferences over something in which another finds enjoyment. It’s the equivalent of telling someone who likes pepperoni pizza that sausage is better because you prefer it  

 

Edited September 10, 2022 by Xatari