Heritage Nov 16-19 Signature Auction 5 5

[tth2]

On 11/18/2023 at 4:38 AM, comix4fun said:

The ultimate conversation piece.

"You paid how much for it?!?!  HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!"

[tth2]

On 11/18/2023 at 4:46 AM, batman_fan said:

Great news, I won’t be looking for a divorce attorney

Peanuts all closed at decent prices except for the Sally daily which I thought was slightly low but not crazy low

Seems like 1950s dailies have come back down from the stratosphere.  I just might win one one of these days.

[tth2]

On 11/18/2023 at 5:17 AM, PhilipB2k17 said:

Remember, Picasso's distorted anatomy paintings were also considered grotesque at one point. 

Yeah, but Picasso was doing it deliberately.

[redrighthand]

My 1.33 cents. The Liefeld price is spot on, if not low.

it's his Mona Lisa. What do I mean by that? It's his most recognizable and well-known piece. People who don't know comics, know this.

Nobody gave a rat's anything about the Mona Lisa for 400 years. It's not DaVinci's best work. Not really even close. Nobody outside of the serious art world cared about it until it was stolen in 1911. Now it gets mobbed on a daily basis by people who think it's the most amazing art thing ever - it's not even the top ten best things in Louvre. It's potential value and its interest is derived from it being a historical artifact more than being a piece of art (whether the layman realizes it or not)

So there it is. It's the Mona Lisa.  

[tth2]

On 11/13/2023 at 11:15 PM, jjonahjameson11 said:

I've been amazed at the incredible composition and dynamic linework of Raymond's Flash Gordon for a few decades now, but narrowing down prices has been elusive for me.  Sometimes I think a piece will sell within my budget (it doesn't) and other times, I don't even bother to bid because i think the piece is so wonderful that it will surely sell for multiples of what I would be willing to pay...missed out on three wonderful pages by this way of thinking.

Long story short, there's a very nice example in the Nov HA auction (at least I think so), and I would love to hear from knowledgeable collectors for Raymond's Flash Gordon OA...what is the expected price range for this piece.

Please DM me with your response

$132k.  What a wonderful piece, from his peak period.  Unfortunately, I tapped out once it hit 6 figures.   

The other Flash Gordon, from 1938 after Raymond had transitioned to a cleaner but no less beautiful style, went for $96k.

  

[Phill the Governor]

The Invincible #1 pgs both did about 55% higher than my guess, which accounted for other recent comps, but not issue one madness.

As others have said though, you don't get it unless you've read the series. It's a groundbreaking modern masterpiece -which is funny because technically the first half dozen issues are now "vintage". Its likely the property will achieve success that rivals if not surpasses The Walking Dead, and that's saying something.

[westform]

On 11/17/2023 at 1:46 PM, batman_fan said:

Great news, I won’t be looking for a divorce attorney

Peanuts all closed at decent prices except for the Sally daily which I thought was slightly low but not crazy low

Sally daily had a great gag, but sadly was still a Sally daily… thought it went high. 

[tth2]

I don't know if all of the Sandman pieces in this auction came from the same collection, but if so, the collector managed the feat of somehow assembling a large collection of Sandman pages that didn't feature Morpheus in any of them (except for a few small images of him (and Death) looking different from their normal selves in the page from #21).

I'm assuming that the page from #12, which did feature Morpheus prominently, came from a different consignor because it was auctioned off separately from the other pages.  

Nonetheless, the pages did relatively well despite being without Morpheus or Death, but the gap with the pages with either of them was big.

The remaining pages coming up in a couple of days also don't feature Morpheus or Death. 

 

[Xatari]

Funny. I thought the same thing. I told a buddy who almost bid due to perceived value that it was like buying a designer item that doesn’t fit. Buying the brand but not really what you’re after. 

[tth2]

On 11/18/2023 at 11:35 AM, westform said:

On 11/18/2023 at 4:46 AM, batman_fan said:

Great news, I won’t be looking for a divorce attorney

Peanuts all closed at decent prices except for the Sally daily which I thought was slightly low but not crazy low

Sally daily had a great gag, but sadly was still a Sally daily… thought it went high. 

Yes, while Sally isn't quite in the league of Peppermint Pattie, Marcie, Woodstock or Spike, she's not that far above them.

[batman_fan]

On 11/17/2023 at 8:38 PM, tth2 said:

Yes, while Sally isn't quite in the league of Peppermint Pattie, Marcie, Woodstock or Spike, she's not that far above them.

[PhilipB2k17]

On 11/17/2023 at 10:38 PM, tth2 said:

Yes, while Sally isn't quite in the league of Peppermint Pattie, Marcie, Woodstock or Spike, she's not that far above them.

Woodstock? 

[Rick2you2]

On 11/17/2023 at 10:16 PM, redrighthand said:

My 1.33 cents. The Liefeld price is spot on, if not low.

it's his Mona Lisa. What do I mean by that? It's his most recognizable and well-known piece. People who don't know comics, know this.

Nobody gave a rat's anything about the Mona Lisa for 400 years. It's not DaVinci's best work. Not really even close. Nobody outside of the serious art world cared about it until it was stolen in 1911. Now it gets mobbed on a daily basis by people who think it's the most amazing art thing ever - it's not even the top ten best things in Louvre. It's potential value and its interest is derived from it being a historical artifact more than being a piece of art (whether the layman realizes it or not)

So there it is. It's the Mona Lisa.  

Prior to 1911, most people’s view of art was pretty much limited to landscapes (like the Hudson School), military monuments and family portraits. They were busy trying to grow food and earn a little money while not dying from disease or in one of those charming little wars the Europeans apparently loved so much. The Mona Lisa may have gained notoriety in 1911, but lots of people knew about the Mona Lisa before then. Napoleon even hung it in his bedroom. DeVinci also wanted to boost public interest in the painting by carrying it around while working on it in order to have it gain attention. The realism and pose of the woman were very unusual at the time it was done, and he knew it (as did his contemporaries).

The Liefield piece is ugly. Mona Lisa would not have been smiling if she saw it, except if she knew PT Barnum’s saying “There is a sucker born every minute”.

[Matches_Malone]

On 11/17/2023 at 10:35 PM, tth2 said:

I don't know if all of the Sandman pieces in this auction came from the same collection, but if so, the collector managed the feat of somehow assembling a large collection of Sandman pages that didn't feature Morpheus in any of them (except for a few small images of him (and Death) looking different from their normal selves in the page from #21).

I'm assuming that the page from #12, which did feature Morpheus prominently, came from a different consignor because it was auctioned off separately from the other pages.  

Nonetheless, the pages did relatively well despite being without Morpheus or Death, but the gap with the pages with either of them was big.

The remaining pages coming up in a couple of days also don't feature Morpheus or Death. 

 

These are solid prices, considering that most pages being offered were not A+ material. 

[comix4fun]

On 11/17/2023 at 6:30 PM, Xatari said:

I’ll chime in from a newer or modern collector point of view.

2. Invincible - some of the comments in the thread are clear indicators many collectors stopped reading in the 80s/90s. This is not a knock, but just a reality. I personally look at BWS Conan like many here look at Invincible. That said, this is one of the most relevant, modern pieces in the auction from my perspective. Created by Robert Kirkman (Walking Dead), the series was adapted as an animated series for Amazon Prime and has been wildly popular. Walking Dead, The Boys, and Invincible were all massive successes for mainstream culture. The page today that went for over $30k was arguably the best in the first issue for reasons previously posted by others. To put it into perspective, a 9.8 graded copy of Invincible #1 sells for mid $3k range in today’s market, so the best original page from this highly desirable issue at a multiple of 10x isn’t unreasonable.

 

I tend to agree with all of this. Invincible is a great book. I was on this title from the beginning. How great it was was clear from the start. That and The Walking Dead were books I grabbed from issue one. Something different and fresh at the time. I was so into those books I tracked down the Serbian publisher that got the rights to produce a bunch of image titles including Invincible and The Walking Dead. He was on a shoestring budget and couldn't afford to produce more than 500 copies of any issue and the #1 issues were around 300 from what he told me. I actually cleaned him out of a lot of what he had to make shipping to the states feasible.....the best part was that He combined The Walking Dead and Invincible into "flip books" One side was TWD and the flip was Invincible. From issue 1 on. 

If you're looking for a rare Walking Dead and Invincible Artifact, finding one of these (especially in nice shape) is a real challenge. A double #1 with such a tiny print run. 



The books became international sensations long before TV seasons hit. So it makes sense that people will seek out those books and pages and value them for both tangible and intangible reasons. So, my commentary was a little more tongue-in-cheek for the froth that this page at auction created. The numbers these days are just so much more outsized that they used to be.

[Phill the Governor]

On 11/18/2023 at 11:21 AM, comix4fun said:

I tend to agree with all of this. Invincible is a great book. I was on this title from the beginning. How great it was was clear from the start. That and The Walking Dead were books I grabbed from issue one. Something different and fresh at the time. I was so into those books I tracked down the Serbian publisher that got the rights to produce a bunch of image titles including Invincible and The Walking Dead. He was on a shoestring budget and couldn't afford to produce more than 500 copies of any issue and the #1 issues were around 300 from what he told me. I actually cleaned him out of a lot of what he had to make shipping to the states feasible.....the best part was that He combined The Walking Dead and Invincible into "flip books" One side was TWD and the flip was Invincible. From issue 1 on. 

If you're looking for a rare Walking Dead and Invincible Artifact, finding one of these (especially in nice shape) is a real challenge. A double #1 with such a tiny print run. 



The books became international sensations long before TV seasons hit. So it makes sense that people will seek out those books and pages and value them for both tangible and intangible reasons. So, my commentary was a little more tongue-in-cheek for the froth that this page at auction created. The numbers these days are just so much more outsized that they used to be.

Thanks for sharing the story, and for your involvement in how these came to be!

[comix4fun]

On 11/18/2023 at 10:58 AM, Phill the Governor said:

Thanks for sharing the story, and for your involvement in how these came to be!

Oh thank you. Funny thing, the guy publishing them was a big fan and not making very much money off of them. I offered him a bounty on early issues to track them down from shops that bought from him which he was thrilled with. He only found a few, but that was a fun time and he wound up putting me in touch with an Argentinian publisher who also got the license for TWD who I guess he met on some message board. I repeated the process there. It really gave me a sense of how huge TWD was even before all the TV series. etc.

The Argentinian publisher was doubling up issues so #1 was 1 and 2, etc. #10 was the Michonne first appearance. 
It was before TWD got soaked into so many marketing areas and got oversaturated. 



 

[Mmehdy]

Barks  Duck painting was about 25K off,..should be around 100K

[Kryptic1]

On 11/18/2023 at 10:56 PM, Mmehdy said:

Barks  Duck painting was about 25K off,..should be around 100K

Same painting sold at Heritage in 2010 for $89,625

[tth2]

On 11/18/2023 at 8:29 PM, Matches_Malone said:

On 11/18/2023 at 11:35 AM, tth2 said:

I don't know if all of the Sandman pieces in this auction came from the same collection, but if so, the collector managed the feat of somehow assembling a large collection of Sandman pages that didn't feature Morpheus in any of them (except for a few small images of him (and Death) looking different from their normal selves in the page from #21).

I'm assuming that the page from #12, which did feature Morpheus prominently, came from a different consignor because it was auctioned off separately from the other pages.  

Nonetheless, the pages did relatively well despite being without Morpheus or Death, but the gap with the pages with either of them was big.

The remaining pages coming up in a couple of days also don't feature Morpheus or Death. 

 

These are solid prices, considering that most pages being offered were not A+ material.

They are.  But it was really hard figuring out how to price them because most of them came from great story arcs but didn't have the main character in them. 

It'll be the same issue with the pieces coming up today, with two pages from a memorably intense scene (which was recreated very well in the Netflix series) but no Morpheus, and one page from #18 (the "cat issue"), a memorable issue in which Morpheus doesn't appear at all.