Comments on: Is Original Art Becoming Extinct?

By: My Bunny Bathroom » Comics Worth Reading

My Bunny Bathroom » Comics Worth Reading — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 12:22:15 +0000

[...] she’s helped me decorate. I earlier bought the originals of her three-part chicken recipe and framed them to go in the kitchen. (Where [...]

By: Johanna

Johanna — Sun, 09 Jan 2011 12:12:10 +0000

Original art usually means the penciled & inked work that the comics are printed from. They’re not photocopies, though. Artists could print out digital pages, but the difference there is, how do you know you’re getting the only one? There’s only one traditional original art board, but an artist could make many copies of the digital work.

By: filmbeats

filmbeats — Sun, 09 Jan 2011 02:01:52 +0000

I thought even before computers and drawing tablets became popular that artists would often sell photocopies of covers or in comic pages they drew by hand (usually already inked but no color or shading). I only bought a few as a kid but they were all large photocopies. I’m guessing when ppl refer to original art they mean the pencil sketches without inking? I don’t see why artists can’t print out and sell the pages they’ve drawn digitally.

By: Grant

Grant — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 21:45:52 +0000

I was lucky that I collected original art in the early 80s. You could still get some great stuff for pretty cheap, and I’m talking a page of Ditko SpiderMan art for a hundred bucks, Kirby FF for 150, or Jim Starlin and Neal Adams art for 50 bucks. There is no way I could afford to buy original art for even the crappiest comic book now.

I framed three pieces about 9 years ago and it was over 300 dollars. Ouch. I’d love to frame more, just can’t afford that luxury for the time being.

Happy holidays!

By: Johanna

Johanna — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 17:23:51 +0000

Oh, no, now we’re talking about arts and crafts! Too much for me. I’m just an appreciater. :)

By: Tara Tallan

Tara Tallan — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 15:50:25 +0000

The sad thing is, back when original comic pages were more commonly seen, I didn’t have the disposable income to afford them. Now that I can, they’re getting harder and harder to find! I did manage to pick up one of Steve Rude’s Nexus pages during his recent fundraiser, and I feel quite smug.

But I, at least, am still doing my part to make sure there are original pages to be purchased. Huzzah for old school! ;-)

Oh, also, Johanna, if you have a lot of things to frame, a mat-cutter is not too expensive and pretty easy to use. If you cut your own mats, framing yourself (either with frames you find at yard sales or new ones) is a breeze.

By: Bill Williams

Bill Williams — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 15:18:53 +0000

There are a few of us old school guys that still bang out drawings on paper because with computers you need the occasional do-over, but you never get the happy accidents. But we are now the exception and not the rule.

When I went to the Austin Comic Con in November, I chatted with Mike McKone about his art. Years ago, I had bought a Teen Titans cover from him and a few other pages from that series. I was interested in art from Avengers Academy, but like most pros he works all digital now.

Maybe the older stuff will eventually be worth what the high end art dealers are trying to charge for their inventory.

By: John Platt

John Platt — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 13:59:15 +0000

There’s still plenty of art to be bought and created — it just might not always be the art created for publication!

By: Johanna

Johanna — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 12:33:28 +0000

Tim, that’s a good suggestion — but some of the pieces we started with are odd-sized and required special mats. I’ll keep that in mind for future, though.

Hal, there’s one from #1 and one from #2, I think. The weird thing is, I don’t recall buying them, but it must have been at an SPX during the 90s.

Ali, yeah, that’s the case with the Watson page — there’s no dialogue on it, which is a shame. I need to reread the story to figure out what’s going on on the page. :)

By: Tim Rifenburg

Tim Rifenburg — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 09:41:37 +0000

If you want to frame your work on the cheap (until you can afford better quality frames) I would suggest buying up framed posters or art from yard sales, discount shops (GoodWill or Salvation Army stores) and thrift type stores. Many times the art / posters are cheap and you can change out the art, for your art. (Plus the Original art you have looks good in the old style frames (in an art deco kind of way). Plus you are storing the art better and you can change out the art like a gallery. I’m envious of the Alan Davis page but like the good taste of the Decarlo pin ups. Great stuff.

By: Hal Shipman

Hal Shipman — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 05:15:25 +0000

Which pages of Zot!? I have two, framed on my study wall. The Death of Drufus (#6, p26) and “Lead us!” (#10, p18).

By: Ali T. Kokmen

Ali T. Kokmen — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 04:07:42 +0000

I felt my own alacrity in original comics art collecting begin to wane when digital lettering became standard. For me, part of the fun of comics original art has to do with the medium’s unique juxtaposition of words and pictures. But when the lettering is digital and does not appear on the original art, the effect is somehow less compelling. The art artifact is somehow a lesser object than the printed piece, rather than an equal-or-better one. And that just feels wrong.

Certainly, some original art collectors feel the same way. Some have turned their collecting toward sketches and commissions. Others, like me, have slowed down collecting considerably (in my case, I’m also priced out of many of the pieces most attractive to my eclectic tastes, but that’s a whole other thing…)

With regard digital artists losing the potential income of original art sales, I know of some commercial illustrators who have made up a bit of the difference by selling prints of their work. Which is an option, though a print (even a limited run) doesn’t have the same cachet as “real” original art. (Plus, for comics artists, I imagine some publisher/proprietors might feel differently about an artist selling prints of a work than they do of them selling a unique piece of original art…)

By: Ed Sizemore

Ed Sizemore — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 04:02:55 +0000

Johanna,

Animation cel collectors are going through the same transition. So much of even ‘hand-drawn’ animation is done on computer now. The best animation collectors can hope for are original concept art and character sketches.

By: Russell Lissau

Russell Lissau — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 03:49:30 +0000

I have mused about this myself in recent years. I have a good-sized collection of original comic art, representing two stages of my life: The first chunk of pieces are from comics I either wrote about as a journalist or were created by artists I interviewed. The second chunk are pages from books I wrote. But the last 3 or 4 comics I wrote were done exclusively digitally — there is no original art for me to hang on my wall from those projects. It also means the artists in question lose potential income by not being able to sell those particular pages to collectors, which is interesting.