Welcome to the first Original Comic Art Tips Newsletter of December, our ninth issue, Yesterday was the day of the Comic Link Auction, I told you this great splash by Chris Bachalo would go for a much lower price than his covers while being of the same quality, somebody made a great deal at about $950. Great affairs were also made by the collectors who bought this Conan by John Buscema for $250 and this Walking Dead page by Charlie Adlard for only $ 400! The Popeye daily strip by Segar was also sold for a pretty low $3.400. It’s interesting to note that this great Incredible Hulk page by McFarlane went for less than a Capullo/McFarlane Spawn page… I’d buy the former. Preacher pages by Steve Dillon are going higher and higher very fast, buy one while you still can.
Remember when I told you that collectors often overlook Heritage’s Sunday auction? This static Dale Keown Incredible Hulk page went for $1.900 on Comiclink, while this Battle page on Heritage went for $1.300… The NCS Auction ended yesterday, the big prices were made, as usual by the rarest pieces. The Mutts daily by Patrick McDonnel went for $3.500, the beautiful Doonesbury for $2.600 and, hold still, the Calvin & Hobbes PRINT signed by Bill Watterson went for $10.100!!!
This week on eBay.
John Buscema – Fantastic Four Original Art
A lot of nice things on Ebay after some slow weeks. Two Joe Mad pages, a Inhumans and a X-Men, a nice Ed McGuinness with many characters and a Mark Bagley with almost everybody. A classic Buscema fight page from Fantastic Four, and a well drawn Adam Kubert Spirits of Vengeance cover.
We can close this section with a Charity Auction, a sketched book by Mark Schulz.
Heritage Sunday Auction
Al Williamson – X9 Daily Original Art
Some nice little pieces on HA: a Barney Google Strip by Billy DeBeck from 1932 with a classic theme, and a Broom Hilda daily by Russell Myers from 1970. The usual beautiful X9 by Al Williamson and the usually good looking Excalibur page by Alan Davis. Look at this painting by Monty Python’s Terry Gilliam, I bet it’s rare, seems like a good investment (it’s also pretty btw). Also rare are this early Paul Pope page and this Jetcat strip by TV’s Jay Stephens.
Comiconnect
Tony Moore – The Walking Dead Original Art
If you wanted to add a Walking Dead page to your collection remember next week’s Comiconnect auction, there are dozens of original pages and covers by Tony Moore, Charlie Adlard and others. As usual with people concentrating their bids on the best pieces you may find something good for a lower-than-usual price.
See you next week with TWD results and the usual great new Comic Art for sale here on Comic Art Tips!
Welcome to Original Comic Art Tips issue 8, an almost all Heritage edition: we start with auction results, then we explore a good Sunday auction and we also have a charity National Cartoonists Society auction to look at.
The never-ending Heritage Signature Auction finally ended, so we have the second part of the results. The nice Jam Disney Art from 1958 went for $ 4.400, it may seem high but I think Comic Art like this will appreciate in the next years going up and up in value. Another artist with big growth margins is Rob Liefeld, the Youngblood DPS went for $ 3.300, his prices started to grow in the last ¾ years when his many enemies understood that, like it or not, Rob has historic value. Prices going up for Hellboy Original Art is no news, as you may remember there were many pieces for different stories offered in this auction, unsurprisingly the highest price was reached with the action page who surpassed $ 10.000, while more atmospheric and better designed pages went for lower prices. Look also at this Dracula page by Mignola where nothing happens… it reached a record. If you’re sad because you can’t afford Mignola Originals anymore you can be happy because you still can buy a 1938 Terry and the Pirates daily by Caniff with Terry, Pat, and Connie for only $ 1.100. I’m very happy for Frank Willard‘s ghost because his art reached a new record worth of the millions of readers he had in the thirties, an exceptional batch of early hand-colored Moon Mullins Sunday strips went for sale and this one reached $ 5.000.
The winner of last Sunday’s Heritage weekly auction was the rare Pearls before Swine sketch that went for more than $ 1.400. Leonard Starr’s Mary Perkins is as usual under appreciated by strip collector with 3 Sundays sold for only $ 400…
Heritage Sunday Auction/NCS Thanks & Giving auction
Doonesbury Original Daily Strip by Garry Trudeau
After the fancy, big, record auction we return with the usual business, the Sunday Auction will be the main attraction for some weeks to come, and there’s a lot of great art going for sale.
Let’s start with the B of B.C. with a funny daily from 1979 courtesy of Johnny Hart, a very nice Gasoline Alley by Frank King from 1933 with a twelve years old Skeezix, a peak period Beetle Bailey original daily strip from 1964 by Mort Walker and to end the daily strip section take a look at this war period Blondie daily from 1942: looks like it was a present for a friend of Chic Young, who wrote a long and funny dedication and hand colored it, sadly it was exposed to light and very little color is still visible.
The superheroes part of the auction has a very beautiful Batman page by Dave Taylor and another Dale Keown Hulk action page.
Members of the NCS donated their thanksgiving day original strips to be auctioned for charity, in this kind of auctions you can usually find some rare pieces like specialty drawings, strips published on a particular day or original art by difficult to find artists. if you’re a fan of comic strips this is an auction to watch and it’s ending next week, I will highlight only the rarest pieces but I’d buy almost everything. A Patrick Mc Donnell Mutts thanksgiving daily, a very funny Bizarro panel by Dan Piraro, a nice Wizard of Id Sunday by Parker and Hart and a very, very particular Doonesbury daily by Garry Trudeau from 1989… these are the difficult to find pieces different from any regular daily and collectors already noticed with many bids after less than 24 hours from the auction opening.
Comic link Focused Auction
Michael Turner – The Darkness Original Art
I finally went through all of the listings for the Comiclink comic art auction ending next week. Not very much to add to last week tips, 3 pieces from Top Cow: an impressive Silvestri/Williams DPS from Cyberforce #5 and two Michael Turner covers, a detailed The Darkness #11 and Witchblade #15.
See you next week for another Comic Art Tips Newsletter!
Welcome to the 7th installment of the Comic Art Tips Newsletter, many big auctions closed recently, so we have a lot of prices to consider. First is Urania Aste with its Nov. 1 auction. Items sold were 131, more or less 35% of the 370 auctioned (not considering lots sold privately after the auction), for a total raised of 222.575 euros, almost a third of which (81.800) came from the Dino Battaglia “auction inside the auction”. 30 of 31 Battaglia pieces were sold, many of which went for two or three times the starting price, many collectors jumped at the rare opportunity to take home a piece of high-quality art. I can’t tell you the same about the other artists’ lots, only 48 of 131 items sold went for more than the starting price. The higher priced lot (25.000 euros estimated) went unsold, the highest price realized was for this Andrea Pazienza page (12.500 euros).
The Heritage Signature Auction is finally underway, some pieces already sold others will be today, the Frank Miller Dark Knight page went for $ 48.000, while 2 Daredevil pages made almost $ 20.000. Also, the Barry Smith Weapon X went for $20.000, pages from great runs of the 80’s are already going between 15 to 25k, if you can find a page from a famous run of the time still going for $1.500-5.000 you should buy it before it’s too late. Speaking of these prices somebody made a good deal buying the Wally Wood Daredevil for $18.000, if a Miller Daredevil goes for the same price, a page from DD #5 drawn by its co-creator will be worth a lot more in the future. As usual Todd McFarlane Spiderman art is going up. A historic piece got the price it deserved, the Spirit cover by Eisner/Fine went for $52.000, same for the Crumb complete sketchbook ($143.000).
This week on eBay.
Will Eisner, Spirit Original Art
Just a little Ebay update this week, (this newsletter is already running too long and there’s not that much on sale anyway). This Will Eisner sketch looks legit to me, and also very nice, and a page from a Mith of my early 90’s collecting, a Wildcats Trilogy page by Jae Lee.
Heritage Sunday Auction
Stephen Pastis, Pearls Before Swine Original Art
Another weak Sunday auction, everybody will spend their Heritage allowance tonight, so as usual take a look at the listings, you may catch something you like at a good price. I noticed 3 Sunday Mary Perkins On Stage strips by Leonard Starr and a rare full cast sketch of Pearls before Swine by Stephan Pastis.
Comic link Focused Auction
John Romita JR, Spiderman Original Art
It’s already time to look into the next Comic Link Original Comic Art auction, from what I’ve seen for now (the first 1/3 of the offered lots) this auction is much better than the last one, starting from the B of Berke Breathed and a ready to hang BLOOM COUNTY Sunday strip. then an Art Adams X-Babies splash from 1989 and a really beautiful Neal Adams Avengers page. Neal Adams’ Marvel Comics art is rarer to come by than his Batman pages and not only because he worked more for DC, I think collectors hang onto them fearing they’ll never find another quality Adams’ Marvel page again.
You dream of a Adlard Walking Dead page with Rick and Michonne fighting zombies? Help yourself. Knowing how much Chris Bachalo covers are going for these days, you may look with interest at this Avengers splash that looks better than a cover… or to a famous Batman Wizard cover by Simon Bisley. Many classic Buscema/Chan Conan Pages (1, 2, 3) but first you should buy this Silver Surfer. Preacher #60 was late in the run but this is an outstanding scene by Steve Dillon. Several early (1985) TMNT originals by Kevin Eastman… speaking of green, the Incredible Hulk then and now by Dale Keown and a cool Pitt Page. The usual McFarlane Spiderman page, a hulk with a nice layout and several rarer (but lately less rare) Spawn pages by Capullo/McF. Sometimes you find a page that tells an entire story, this Romita JR Spiderman has it all: the radioactive spider bite on the background of a fistfight, and we can end this first part with Popeye By Segar eating spinach.
This is the end of the longest Comic Art Tips Newsletter so far, we’ll return next week with the last Heritage Auction results and the second half of Comic Link November auction!
Here it is, the 6th issue of Original Comic Art Tips, the newsletter for Comic Art collectors. Last week I promised to look at the results of Urania‘s latest auction in Lucca but I need more time to properly analyze the sold/unsold items, come back here next week… for now you can look at the results yourself. Comic Link’s auction is ending tonight and many good originals are still going low, maybe somebody will be very happy tomorrow morning! Let’s start with our usual scouting for the best new art for sale on the web!
This week on eBay.
I always liked Cully Hamner‘s style, his artwork has been rare to find since two movies starring his character RED were produced. We have a nice Punisher half splash to look at. Then here’s a Superman/Batman cover by Gary Frank and a very well drawn Ed McGuinness cover. If you’re searching for a cheap John Buscema there’s a quick Captain America signed gesture drawing.
Heritage Sunday Auction
8 more days to the big Signature Auction, prices for many pieces are going up quickly (look for the McFarlanes and Millers I linked you a couple weeks ago) but there are always some gems to be found on next sunday’s weekly auction like this Dennis the Menace panel by Hank Ketcham (prices for Ketcham’s artwork went up in the last years, this may be a good bet if it goes for under $500/550). Speaking of syndicated strips there are four pretty rare and beautifully drawn Shoe sundays by Jeff Mac Nelly.
We can close this section with a complete 8 page story by Al Williamson (this will go up, last week’s 3 pages lot went for more than $2.000).
Russ Cochran
Very few lots in Cochran’s next Comic Art Auction, but the profits are going to charity, so bid if you like something! there are several nice dinosaur color drawings by Dean Yeagle who will look good on a wall.
Then there’s a very nice Zits one panel daily by Jim Borgman.
We close this newsletter with a 20% off sale on several artists’ Original Comic Art on Splash Page Art, come back next week for the usual great art and auction results!
Today we begin the second month of Comic Art Tips, there are no closed auctions to look at since last week was an all Heritage auction preview newsletter. Today is the day of the live Urania Aste auction, we’ll see next week the more interesting sales.
This week on eBay.
Let’s look at what’s new on Ebay, there’s a rare Warren Comics page by Alex Toth, and a rare Ben Casey sunday by Neal Adams.
There’s the usual Tomb of Dracula original, this time not by Colan, a nice Gil Kane cover.
Heritage Sunday Auction
This week you should take a quick glance to Heritage’s Sunday Auction. Everybody is saving for the Signature Auction, so this one might go underlooked.
Here’s an exceptional Casey Ruggles sunday by Warren Tufts, a nice and early Love and Rockets page by Jaime Hernandez, and a great 3 page sequence by Al Williamson.
Galerie du 9ème Art
Many said that the recent Valerian movie was a flop, but Valerian is still one of the most famous french characters/album series, 9Art put a page for sale some days ago.
See you next week for the next issue of Comic Art Tips!
With this fourth newsletter, we end the first month of Original Comic Art Tips. This is an almost mono thematical issue about the forthcoming Heritage Auction, but first, let’s take a look at last week results.
The FAKE Bill Watterson went for $755 and the forger is already doing well with new auctions… The Dracula by Colan made his former owner a good $1.150 and the Jack Davis EC complete story was sold by Russ Cochran for 35k…
Heritage Nov 16-18 Signature Auction part 2
Batman cover by Jim Lee
There’s so much great art on HA’s catalog that was very difficult to choose today’s lots. I mixed three ingredients: Historical pieces, big money pieces and my personal taste in artwork.
They have 26 Jack Kirby pieces, none is really important, this Captain America/Black Panther page is my favorite.
Many pages also by Kirby fan Mike Mignola, we have a historical page from Seed of destruction, an all-Hellboy Wake the devil, the one I’d buy from The corpse and much more.
Steve Ditko is also here with a Doctor Strange page with the doctor in every panel, a really historic piece that may go up in price now that Strange is appearing in movies.
Another historic piece is this Daredevil # 5 by Wally Wood, and I’d like to hang on my wall this detailed MAD page. This will go for a lower price than the Daredevil but I would enjoy it much more.
Take a look at the cover of Kraven‘s last hunt part 3 by Mike Zeck. Speaking of Spiderman many are trying to capitalize on Todd McFarlane pages and this is an incredible example.
You can love him, you can hate him… straight from the 90’s a Youngblood DPS by Rob Liefeld.
This Batman Wizard cover by Jim Lee will look great on your wall.
I’m a big fan of Tony Moore and I’m curious to see how much this (once obscure) Battle Pope cover will go for and if the new Walking Dead fans are interested in this. Since we are speaking of priests here’s a nice page from Preacher #1 by Steve Dillon.
A great Spirit cover by Will Eisner and Lou Fine.
Robert Crumb is also represented by many pieces but I’d really like to flip the pages of this complete sketchbook. (look at the video!)
These are my highlights for this auction but look at the entire catalog by yourself if you have the time, many other great pieces.
Before we close this section, don’t forget this Sunday’s weekly auction, I will only show you this incredibly well drawn Johnny Hazard Sunday page by Frank Robbins.
This week on Ebay
Chris Samnee – Batman Original Art
This newsletter is already full of original comic art to look at but there’s this great Frank Cho cover for sale and a new batch of Chris Samnee Inktober Batman Sketches.
See you next week for the best Original Comic Artwork for sale on the web!
Welcome to the third Original Comic Art Tips Newsletter, the big news of last week was the record price set for an Asterix original cover, Drouot sold two pieces for a total of 2.6 million Euros with an estimated price of 200.000 Euros. It was only a matter of time before the prices for one of the best comics ever produced reached this level.
Let’s look at last week results: as predicted John Buscema’s Daredevil page went for an affordable $665 and Alan Davis’ Excalibur went for a respectable $1.493. The Witchblade page by Michael Turner sold for $826, that means MT’s originals are so sought after that even his less appealing artwork is going up in price…
This week on eBay.
Todd McFarlane Spiderman original art
Many of John Romita Sr‘s fans only consider his Spiderman interior artwork but I often flip through his Captain America run, a page with The Falcon was put on sale a couple days ago for a fair price.
There’s a Todd McFarlane Spiderman #301 page in Hawaii!
Beware of this dude selling a “well done” Bill Watterson FAKE drawing. A good tip to evaluate if an original is real or a forgery on eBay is to go look at his other auctions, they often sell names too big to be real, this one is trying to sell us a Kandinsky….
We close this section with another very nice Gene Colan Dracula Original Art page.
Heritage Nov 16-18 Signature Auction
Barry Windsor-Smith Original Weapon X artwork
It is very hard to choose a few highlights from a Ha Signature Auction, this week I looked at the first half of the catalog, tune in next week for the second half.
There are several lots from Barry Windsor-Smith, I will only show you this page from Weapon X!
In the Classic Comic Strip market, I often prefer a nice and rare specialty drawing to a regular daily strip. I’d buy this jam Christmas drawing by some of the best Disney artists ever…
For the usual 90’s fans out there a rare PITT page by Dale Keown.
Great selection of Frank Miller Original Art, this Dark Knight Returns interior page must be on the Watch List of a lot of people.
Comic link Focused Auction
Tellos Original Cover by Mike Wieringo
A rare Joe Madureira X-Men page on Comic Link right now, an even rarer Tellos cover by Mike Wieringo and not much else to note.
Russ Cochran Auction
The monthly Cochran Auction is ending next Thursday with a Jack Davis Tales From The Crypt full story currently going for $ 28K
See you next week for the usual must watches and the second half of Heritage’s auction Original Art section!
You’re reading the Second issue of Comic Art Tips, this week we start by looking at how some of the auctions from the previous newsletter went.
Only one of the two Popeye strips has sold, eBay is not the perfect market for high end Original Comic Strip Art, but this one still managed to go for $ 5.250.
On Heritage, the rare Bone original art was sold for a “surprising” $ 2,868 despite being only a promo piece. The investment here is at least guaranteed by the fact that all of Jeff Smith‘s original art was donated to a library so this piece will always be considered rare.
The Comic Link Auction is ending on Friday, don’t forget!
This week on eBay
Chris Samnee – Batman/Ra's al Ghul original art
If you hate 90’s Image style don’t click on this link. this is not Stephen Platt‘s best double page spread, but it’s still worth watching!
I love all of Joe Kubert’s war genre covers and there’s a new one for sale with the Haunted Tank.
John Buscema superhero art is getting more and more difficult to afford for most collectors but if you don’t consider that this page was done in the nineties and it’s from Doom 2099 you have an opportunity to gain a Buscema Daredevil 2/3 splash… just be smart because it’s getting a lot of traffic.
As you may already know Chris Samnee’s originals are rare and sought after. He’s doing the Inktober daily challenge and the first week of Batman-themed originals are for sale. My favorite is Commissioner Gordon but I like ’em all.
Heritage Sunday Auction
Pogo by Walt Kelly Original Art
Just a few suggestions for this week, Heritage is keeping the best for November’s big Auction… I like this dense Sub Mariner #37 page by Ross Andru and this is one of the many pages they sold this year from Alan Davis‘ celebrated Excalibur run.
Please buy this great Pogo Sunday by Walt Kelly from 1955.
Urania Aste – November 1 Comic Art Auction
Urania’s latest catalog surprised me, there’s great art from all over the world and it’s eclectic, there’s something great for everybody, I’d like to buy at least 80% of it.
The auction has a section dedicated to the genius of Dino Battaglia, this splash is my favorite but they’re all beautiful.
Here we have 2 important Jack Kirby pieces, a historical page from Fantastic Four #20 and a Kamandi splash.
I’ve always loved this illustration by Andrea Pazienza and this page by Magnus is great.
This is the end of the second issue of Comic Art Tips, next week you’ll find the usual Original Comic Art highlights and I’ll probably start to watch lots from HA’s November Auction.
Welcome to the first issue of Original Comic Art Tips. I started collecting original art in 1995 and I’ve been following the online market since the dawn of eBay. I look at every listing on eBay, Heritage and all the different auction houses offering comic art lots, I also check dealers websites regularly searching for updates and the perfect piece to add to my collection. Lately I had the idea that all this work I do for myself may be useful to other collectors who can’t spend hours online every week and decided to start a newsletter. In the coming weeks, you can expect to find 2/5 links for every auction who is about to close, alerts for dealers websites who updated their offerings and general news on our hobby.
Let’s get started!
This week on eBay
Popeye by Segar Original Art for sale
Just a few worthy pieces for us on eBay, don’t forget to take a look at these two beautiful Popeye dailies by Segar ending next week: one is a classic punch fight with Bluto and the other has Popeye, Olive Oil and Eugene the Jeep.
For the many fans of Mike Mignola, there’s a great (no Hellboy, sorry) pencil illustration.
And for a 90’s nostalgic like me a nice and cheap Mark Silvestri and Scott Williams interior page from Cyberforce #5 starring Ripclaw ending SOON.
Heritage Sunday Auction
Bone by Jeff Smith Original Art for sale
Heritage’s weekly Sunday Auction gets overlooked by most so it’s a great way to snag great Comic Art for cheap, you just have to find the few diamonds hidden between filler material, but I’ve done the hard part for you. Sadly we start with a slow week, but we have one of the few published Bone pieces by Jeff Smith on the market (Smith never sold his pages and donated them to Ohio State University), I know it’s not the piece you dreamed of but…
Then consider this 1979 Star Wars strip by the great Russ Manning starring C-3PO and Luke Skywalker. Star Wars items from the 70’s are always a good investment.
We end with a classic, an Alex Toth / Dick Giordano page from Hot Wheels #1. I had a page from the same issue for years (traded it for a Hate page by Peter Bagge) the cool part is that Toth penciled and lettered them in blue pencil, so all his lines are there to see.
Don’t forget to save money for the November 16-18 Signature Auction, I’ll send you my highlights in a forthcoming newsletter!
Comic link Focused Auction
Dracula by Gene Colan Original Art for sale
Nothing big this time on Comic Link, a nice example from one of my favorite series: Tomb of Dracula by Gene Colan, Dracula vs Blade. (I had two originals from this series, all gone years ago, but still searching for the perfect one).
Not one but three Dawn painted illustrations by Linsner (this is the one I’d buy). He does a ton of them but they’re always nice if taken for the right price.
Speaking of 90’s nostalgia many will fondly remember the first issues of Witchblade by a young Michael Turner. If you thought that a Turner original is out of your league this one may be for you.
This is the end of the first issue of Comic Art Tips, next week you’ll find the usual Original Comic Art highlights and we’ll start to dig into the great catalogue of Urania Aste‘s next auction.
