Sunday, August 5, 2012

McFarlane's Amazing Spider-Man 328 cover original comic book artwork sells for $657,250.00 record price.

Before this becomes old news, the original comic book artwork for Todd McFarlane's Amazing Spider-Man 328 cover sold recently for a $657,250.00.  The original comic book artwork for Todd McFarlane's Spider-Man 1 sold for a surprisingly low (at least it was to me) $358,500.00.

Oh man, I remember when these books were so popular when they came out in 1990.  I remember rushing to the  comic book shop (sorry, nothing was available online back then) and buying multiple copies of the books.  I was fortunate to get copies of all the bagged and unbagged versions of the #1 issue.  Was so excited back then.  Alas, I still have them in some random closet , never read, still bagged and boarded (rebagged/reboarded since).  One of these days I will pull them out and reminisce over them.  Until then, I will enjoy looking at the original comic book artwork of the covers from these books.  :-)



While the Spider-Man 1 cover may be more iconic, could it be the ASM 328 cover is more noteworthy because it features not only Spidey but also Hulk?  And of course, Amazing Spider-Man is the grand-daddy of Spiderman comic titles, and I'm sure collectors place a premium on original artwork from this title.  Regardless, the ASM 328 cover artwork came at the peak time of McFarlane's run at Marvel.  Or could it have been that most collector's figured the cover for SM 1 was going to hit a higher realized value, and as such, didn't want to get into a bidding war with other high rollers.  Maybe Todd himself?  There was a lot of talk about the SM 1 cover hitting a million dollars weeks leading up to the auction.

As an original comic book artwork collector, I think this was a good thing for the hobby but not a great thing, at least I'm not sure if it is great yet.  It does make non-comic book art collectors take notice that this is a growing segment for the art collector niche.  I think it opens more eyes just for the fact this sold for as much as it did when the economy really isn't doing great still.  Judging from comments I read online at sites such as Yahoo, CBS and other "mainstream" non-comic/non-art, most people think this was a waste of money.  I think this may have been a shrewd investment as I can foresee original art continue to grow in the short and long term.  However my concern is if these high priced public transactions have pushed the smaller low budget collectors out of the hobby or have they separated them even more from the mid/high end art collector.  It already requires a substantial cash investment to get started in this hobby for those new to collecting original comic book art.  It will only get more pricey in the years to come.

Would love to hear your take on these record setting transactions of original comic book artwork.

Link to ha.com press release on the ASM 328 cover original comic book artwork record breaking auction.

Kevin Maguire Justice League International original poster artwork 1987

Here's a blast from the past.

You don't see Justice League International original artwork for sale on eBay often, or at least I don't remember seeing any late 80s/early 90s Kevin Maguire artwork on eBay in many many years.  So when the original art for a poster and original artwork from issue 4 went up on eBay last week, I was pleasantly surprised. 

Hopefully there will be more Kevin Maguire JLI original artwork coming out of art collector closets.  I would definitely be interested and you'd get some bids from me.  If you have some for sale, email me directly.  :-)

The original artwork for the poster sold for what I thought was an amazing amount of loot.  $8,877.77 is a lot of coin.  Granted, this is a great looking team shot done by the main artist of this best selling comic book title which had the quirky characters and stories.  Good times.

Kevin Maguire original artwork for a Justice League International poster from 1987.

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Really Sotheby Girls?

Just found an interesting article about working at Sotheby's, and lessons learned. Sotheby Girls huh?

Artinfo.com article "Cool Girls Got off at Contemporary.."

N+1 Magazine excerpt

Thursday, February 2, 2012

Jim Lee Scott Williams Batman 617 panel page from Hush


I remember when these pages were first available in 2002/03 and they were selling like hotcakes. Turns out these pages are still worth their weight in gold, and given the large number of bidders on this recent Hush panel page auction that just closed, things could be heating up in 2012.

20 bidders brought this auction to $3050.00. The original art of Batman 617 page 20 featuring Jim Lee pencils and Scott Williams inks is a nice example of the art from Hush. This is all-in-all a pretty nice panel page. Has some excellent large images of Batman especially the 2 large views of the Dark Knight at the top of the page.

Hopefully with the large number of bidders and high realized original art prices for recent auctions (see above and see previous post today re: Neal Adams Brave and Bold page), we will see more great pages come out of hiding and go up on eBay before comic book convention season starts.

NOTE This page sold on Heritage in Nov 2011 for $4780.00

Neal Adams Brave and Bold 86 page from 1969


Welcome 2012.

I've been distracted with life since my last post. But I have been browsing original art on eBay again since late last year and noticing original art price trends seem to be going upwards slightly. Am I reading this properly? If so, forget the banks. I'm investing in original comic book art. Case in point...

The post I'd like to share today is a sweet early Neal Adams Brave and Bold 86 page 4 that sold today. Iconic Neal Adams Batman in the top pane and gotta love the irregular shaped panels. This page is just so clean in layout makes me wish I bid a tad more. All Neal Adams artwork.

According to the auction description, this page was purchased from Heritage for $3107.00 in Nov 2011. Couple hundred bucks profit in a few months. :)

UPDATE 3/12/2012: Just saw this same page for sale on an art dealer site for $6500.00 this morning.

UPDATE 8/4/2012:  Artwork is still available for sale for $6500.  Great looking page though.