This is the first report I post on this blog. I’ve been doing Original Comic Art auction reports weekly, since October 2017, in the Original Comic Art Tips newsletter. Click here to see this week’s newsletter (for Ebay, Heritage Sunday and the smaller auction houses) and if you’re not a subscriber go on the homepage and subscribe, it’s free!
Original Comic Art Auction Report, Heritage Signature – Feb.19
Frank Frazetta, Buck Rogers, Famous Funnies cover art, $552k. Frazetta is probably more known/collected as a fantasy painter, so a price like this for early comics work is especially interesting. At the same time this is one of his most beloved pieces of original comic art, we’ll see if this result will drive to an increase in price for all of his non painted comic art.
Arthur Adams, X-Men poster original art, $49,2k. If you’re a fan of Arthur Adams it doesn’t get better than this, a classic image from 1989 with dozens of mutants and a big image of Wolverine. The high price is justified and what’s better than hanging on the wall the original art used for a poster? Do you know it was already sold in a past Heritage Auction exactly 5 years ago? In 2014 the same piece made $31k.
Dave Gibbons, Watchmen #1 Original Cover art, $228k. Another classic and historic piece, put for sale when the hype for the new TV series is high. This strategy worked very well, as this original art piece was already auctioned on Heritage in February 2013 for $155k. What seemed like a crazy price just six years ago is not crazy anymore..!
Steve Ditko, Doctor Strange 8 page complete story Original Comic Art, $693,6k (8 pieces total). Heritage had the good idea of splitting the story and sell the individual pages. The splash alone made $228k a price level usually only reached by his Spider-Man Original Art.
Ron Lim, Infinity Gauntlet #6 page #8 original art, $10,8k. Prices for Ron Lim interior Original Comic Art (high-end pieces from Cosmic books) are rising quickly. This piece makes the Heritage record and all runner ups were sold in the last year.
Alex Toth, Zorro reprint cover, $12,6k. Published cover art by Alex Toth is as rare as his original art for Zorro, that’s why a reprint cover makes an Heritage record for the artist (and it’s also a beautiful piece!).
Bob Layton, Iron Man #240 Cover Original Comic Art, $19,2k. Another Heritage auction record. Layton Iron-Man covers recently sold for less than half this price. This is a great looking cover, but part of the art is on an overlay, making this cover a bit difficult to display.
Other art:
$40k for the cover sketch of Mad #1 by Harvey Kurtzman makes it probably one of the highest paid prices for preliminary comic art. This Cover/pinup sold for $22k, very high for a piece of Jim Lee original art from Wildstorm.
A beautiful Matt Baker cover went for $44k, the 2 page origin of Wonder Woman comic art by Adam Hughes for $16k, a great Al Williamson Star Wars page for $20k. This Uncanny X-Men page by Marc Silvestri was sold for $6,6k, a 1924 Orphan Annie daily strip original went for $17k, a poster size original Dick Tracy portrait by Chester Gould went for $5k. Regular sized sketches usually go for less than $1,000.
Original Hellboy covers by Mike Mignola have been sold lately for $20k, this is not the most detailed cover ever but for $7k it is probably a good investment for the future. An Andru/Sinnott Fantastic Four DPS for $2,7k looks like a good deal to me, original art for a Hulk cover by Dale Keown for less than $10k is not bad. A Wolverine cover by Sam Kieth went for $16,8k, a Thor title splash by John Buscema for $5k, a Demon sketch by Jack Kirby for less than $2k and a nice original Spawn DPS by Angel Medina went for $660.
