Original Comic Art Tips #185 – Romita Jr., Ottley, Kirby!

Welcome to #185 of Original Comic Art Tips! Get ready for a lonnnng results section… I’ll have to postpone ComicLink results to next week.

eBay: the Spider-Man sketch by John Romita was sold for $4,2k, an Hellboy cover by Mike Mignola went for a $12k Best Offer, a Captain America page by Jack Kirby for $2,9k, the Spidey House AD for $2,1k, the JLA cover by Gary Frank was finally sold for a $2,250 B.O., the Flash cover for $3,6k, a Venom sketch by Artgerm for a $2k B.O., a Fantastic Four cover recreation by Neal Adams for $2k.

The W.C. Avengers page by John Byrne went for $1,9k, 3 nice Pogo dailies for $1k, a great Batman page by Don Newton for a $1,250 B.O.

Hero Initiative Auctions: the McGuinness/Keown Hulk went for $7,4k, the Leonardi/SlineySpider-Man 2099 for $1,5k, the Kubert/Garcia LopezWolvie/Cap for $1k.

Steve Ditko self-published comic pages started to come out a year ago, first, they went unsold, a few months ago a few were sold for $500/600, now this one went for $1k. In the last HA signature auction two complete stories were sold, the first for $650 a page, and the second for $850 a page.

Heritage Weekly Auction: the Sgt. Fury page by Kirby went for $21k, the Spider-Man page by Keith Pollard for almost $9k, the Star Wars page by Bob McLeod for $7k. Another high price for an inked blueline, this cover over printed Mike Wieringo pencils went for $1,2k.

Heritage Signature Auction: $288k for the first appearance of Daredevil by Bill Everett, $192k for the cover of Lobo #1 by Simon Bisley, one of the most iconic pieces from the ‘90s, $120k for the cover by Dave Stevens, $102k for the first appearance of Nightcrawler by Dave Cockrum.

Let’s then see a few HA record prices (basically 90% of pieces were a record of some sort, can’t show them all) $96k for a Thor cover by John Buscema, prices for Dr. Strange covers by Frank Brunner continue to go up, we’re at $90k, $75k is a really high price for a Peanuts Sunday from 1993 (in 2018 a ’90s Sunday went for $55k). The growth continues for Spider-Man original art by Erik Larsen, this splash went for $50k, I remember being surprised by this splash sold in 2019 for $15k…

Ronin pages by Frank Miller don’t come very often for sale, $48k is not comparable anymore with older sales. Records also for Travis Charest, Jim Mooney, Ron Wagner, Steve Dillon, Bob McLeod (helped by the Star Wars franchise).

Other artists made a record for panel pages only: another jump for X-Men original art by Jim Lee, we’re at $33k (but somebody will be really happy with this Classic X-Men page bought for $12k), Mike Golden is at $40k, Art Adams at $15k, Ross Andru at $26k, Mike Zeck at $29k, Infantino at $33k.

A Wonder Woman (UK) cover by Bolland was sold for only $13k.

Some nice pieces were sold for $5k and under: a Conan pinup by John Buscema, Hulk Vs. Thing by Starlin for $4,5k, a Venom DPS by Ron Lim for $4,3k, an Avengers cover by Steve McNiven for $3,3k, a very nice Thor page by John Buscema went for $2,2k, a great Superman page by Gil Kane for $2k.

Heritage Garfield Auction: Have you already heard “record prices” today? the record for Garfield art was made only two weeks ago with this early, and very funny, daily sold for $6k, but that was only a regular strip, this time we had the first appearance of Liz, sold for $11k, first Squeak for $7k, first mom & dad and Christmas 1980 for $6,6k. The record for a Sunday was made in 2020 for $5,7k, this time we had a 1999 Sunday sold for $4,5k.

Catawiki Auctions: the page by Milo Manara was sold for €3,1k, a color guide for an Asterix illustration for €1,7k.

Weiss Auctions: I can’t tell if the prices are before or after the 20% B.P. was added… the covers to Hulk #252 and Defenders #85 by Rich Buckler were sold for $16k and $13,5k respectively, a Spider-Man 2099 cover by Joe Kubert went for $9,5k, G.I. Combat #277 and a Flash commission both went for $5,7k, a Sgt. Rock page for $5,2k, an Iron-Man half splash by Tuska for $3k.

Art-Rite: most of the pieces went unsold, the bigger results were for Andrea Pazienza,(€8,5k, €8,5k, €8k), Stefano Tamburini (€2,6k and €1,5k) and Pablo Echaurren at €1,1k.

This week on eBay

Spider-Man Original Comic Art

Marvel: remember last week’s uncredited Spidey pages? The seller has some more pieces, like this 1980 Spectacular Spider-Man page by John Romita Jr. and Jim Mooney. Oops, now it’s not a secret anymore…

Some Spidey pages by Greg LaRocque, a very nice UK Spider-Man splash by Stiles/Esposito, another uncredited Spidey page, a full team Micronauts page by Pat Broderick, some Hulk Sunday pages by Larry Lieber.

A Frankenstein cover by Gene Colan, an Iron-Man page by Herb Trimpe, Shang-Chi by Dan Day, this vintage Spider-Man sketch by Gil Kane seems real.

Dr. Strange art by Geof Isherwood, Hulk Vs. Thing by Romita Jr.

Hero Initiative Auctions: a Venom/Spidey illustration by Humberto Ramos and Ryan Stegman that was chosen as a Venom variant cover, Harley/Punchline by Mico Suayan and Jerome Opena, a Martian Manhunter splash by Tom Mandrake, an Avengers page by Mahmud Asrar.

DC: Anarky by Norm Breyfogle, Batman by Jim Balent, a Superman DPS by Stuart Immonen, some Shazam color costume designs by Gary Frank, a Batman commission by David Mack.

I’m not an expert on manga sketches (they all seem fake to me) but there’s a Batman shikishi by Kia Asamiya.

Some very good Invincible pages by Ryan Ottley, one, two, three, and four. There’s also a well done Chewbacca commission by Ottley.

A Nibelung page by Gil Kane and some strips: a Bringing Up Father daily and a Dennis The Menace panel by Ketcham.

Heritage Weekly Auction

Jack Kirby – Superpowers Original Comic Art

DC: great Super Powers page by Jack Kirby, Batman by Irv Novick, Dick Dillin, Gene Colan, Carmine Infantino, Superman by Curt Swan, Superman by Tom Grummett, Outsiders by Kevin Nowlan.

Marvel: Thor by Keith Pollard, Iron-Man by Tuska, Shang-Chi by Mazzucchelli, Human Torch by Frank Cho.

A Spawn page by Capullo/McFarlane, a MAD page by Don Martin, a very nice Lash La Rue story by Bob Powell.

Strips: a Yogi Bear Sunday, a Prince Valiant illustration by Murphy Anderson, a Beetle Bailey Sunday,

Catawiki Auctions

A western page and a Druuna color guide by Serpieri, an illustration by Jacovitti, Mickey Mouse by Silvia Ziche, a nice painted page by Meglia, a drawing by Pinter, a nice Tex page by Roberto De Angelis.

Pierre Tombal by Hardy, an XIII page by Vance, a Marsupilami sketch by Franquin, a page and an illustration by Crisse, an illustration by Dany.

A page prelim by Will Eisner, a Dracula page by Gene Colan, a Wonder Woman commission by Goran Sudzuka, and an Andy Capp strip.

See you next week!!