Via a press release, and speaking of Frank Miller, Heritage Auctions set a record by selling a page of Miller art from Daredevil #188 for $101,575. According to Todd Hignite, who is Consignment Director for Original Comic and Illustration Art for Heritage, it’s a record for original art from the ’80s, and “one of the handful of highest prices that Heritage has ever seen paid for a piece of comic art, period. It’s in very rarefied company.”
The Heritage Comics & Comic Art Auction overall saw more than 1900 bidders competing for more than 1200 lots. The $3.2 million+ total represents an astounding 99.35% sell-through rate by total lots.
Superman has been much in the news lately for record-setting copies of his early adventures, and the May 21 auction added to that recent run as two bound volumes of ACTION COMICS #1-24 (1938-1940) sold for the most ever paid for a bound volume lot when it brought $143,400.
Among other bestsellers, a page of Robert Crumb’s very early Fritz the Cat story, “Fritz Comes on Strong,” which sold for $35,850. A high-grade copy of ZAP #1 sold for $26,290, a record for an undergound comic. Finally, a page of Far Side art by Gary Larson sold for $20,315. Such pieces rarely come onto the market, the release noted.
Holy crapola.
Do you know which page it was, Heidi?
The cover to Daredevil #188 is shown.
There was another page (p.16) from Daredevil #181, by Miller and Klaus Janson which also sold.
The two Larson strips were “The Postman Carried Mace” and “Jiminy Cricket” (which sold for $20K).
Lots of nice stuff! A Carl Barks painting, Superduperman original art, Frazetta comics art…
The page from Daredevil #181 sold for $11,352.50.
Impressive.
Do we know who owns (if not the creators) the original cover art for key ’80s comics?
Like, who’s got the original art for the Killing Joke cover (if it’s not in Bolland’s hands)? The Dark Knight issue 1 “lightning bolt” cover? Hulk 340? I could see any of those (and many more) reaching well into the six, possibly seven figures.
VeryFineNearMint.com
So, Blackeye, is your deal trolling in general or trolling Frank Miller in particular? You’ve got posts in the last two Beat articles going after him like a creepy fanboy.
Thanks for posting this. I suspect the most valuable page of artwork I own is the WORST page from Miller’s The Dark Knight I bought 22 years ago for $100. And, it’s so not fun, I never framed it.
Here’s why I still own it: I’ve given up a bunch of classic comics I wish that I’d kept, even in ragged states (FF #5, JLA #1, Spider-Man #4-20, King Features series of the Phantom and Flash Gordon, Gold Key Tarzan comics by Russ Manning, Creepy and Errie Yearbooks with classic Gray Morrow and Steve Ditko stories that still hold up wonderfully to this day and any Dr. Solar and Doom Patrol comics come to mind) over many moves in my life.
Nevertheless, it warms my heart to know that I’m lucky enough to legitimately own a piece of comics history…
Had a chance to buy a page from #3 that was partly redrawn by FM after a falling out with Klaus Janson (KJ was RIGHT, BTW) for $200-250 but took a pass. Woulda, shoulda, coulda…
Impressive! Love to see a gallery of Miller’s original art