By the end of the day November 15, results at Heritage Auction Galleries added up to more than $5 million in its vintage comics and comic art signature auction. Heritage was watching closely to see if the total would beat its own record of $5.2 million for comic art set in 2002.
With the very best of the original Mad Magazine cover art leading the way, accompanied by a #1 Walt Disney comic and an amazing “attic find” collection of original Golden Age comic book cover art via the Szenics collection, there was good reason to believe that record might fall.
“This was the second biggest comic auction that anyone has ever had,” said Barry Sandoval, director of operations for the comics division at Heritage, “second only to the $5.2 million auction that we held six years ago, which still holds the Guinness World Record.”
There were several notable records set in the sale, including the highest price paid at auction for a US comic art lot when Norman Mingo’s original artwork for Mad Magazine #30, the first to feature Alfred E. Neuman as its principal figure, sold for $203,150. The entire group of Mad Magazine cover art, the very best of the original works created for the publication, nearly doubled its presale estimate, accounting for $746,000 of the auction total.
While it may not have gotten the same presale media attention as the Mad Magazine artwork, a Walt Disney’s Comics and Stories #1, featuring a mischievously winking Donald Duck, did not disappear from the screens of serious comic and Disneyana collectors. Intense bidding pushed the price of the comic ever higher until it reached $116,000.
“It’s easily the highest price ever paid for a Disney comic,” said Sandoval, “but then this was also the only true near mint copy of this key #1 that we’ve ever seen or heard of.”
The Zoltan M. Szenics collection was the source of great preauction speculation, as it presented a rare opportunity to offer a large grouping of very well preserved Golden Age comic book art, including examples of original art from Golden Age luminaries Lou Fine and Will Eisner.
The 43 lots did not disappoint. The art that was gathered by Zoltan Szenics and his wife, Theresa, both artists in the comics business in the 1930s, was basically stored away in the attic of an heir after the Szenics died. Buyers happily spent $187,603 to take home some of this classic, early comic art, with Fine’s cover art for Uncle Sam #11 lighting the way at $55,268.
“First rate Golden Age art from this early period is incredibly rare,” said Todd Hignite, comics consignment director at Heritage, “and Lou Fine’s over-the-top patriotic covers for World War II-themed National Comics must count among the most exciting comic art finds of recent history. That this collection survived at all is miraculous given the way the art was treated seven decades ago, but to surface with such a singular provenance is exceptional.”
All prices given include the buyer’s premium.
Heritage’s next signature comics and comic art auction will be February 26′7. For information, 800-872-6467 or www.HA.com .
