Bidding will end soon on Frank Frazetta’s painting for the Lancer paperback book cover of Robert E. Howard’s Conan story, “Rogues in the House.”
It’s currently at $8,500,000, with Heritage Auction’s so-called Buyer’s Premium taking it up to $10,625,000.
This is Barry Smith’s cover illustration for the Marvel Comics adaptation of the story, as written by Roy Thomas.
Here is an interesting comparison. It’s Bernie Wrightson’s illustration for Poe’s “Murders in the Rue Morgue.”
I am currently the high bidder on this Heritage Auctions item. With all three Harvey Comics leading characters — Richie Rich, Casper, and Wendy — together in the first panel of a 5-page story, how could I resist?
The drawings were by a Harvey Comics mainstay, Warren Kremer. The clean, simple lines, as required for Harvey’s humor titles, contrast with the publisher’s Fifties horror comics, as seen in these examples.
This unpublished cover is also attributed to Kremer, demonstrating his masterful brushwork that’s anything but simple.
I’d say this one appears more likely to be the work of Lee Elias.
Some books about comic books I spotted recently at the Boston Public Library.
A happy bit of news is that Joe Staton is Svengoolie’s latest featured artist.
https://metvmall.com/collections/svengoolie-artist-collection
As soon as I saw those glasses with Joe’s design, I had to have one in red and one in black. My buddy Bismo and I tried them out last Friday night.
Sven and Joe first met some years ago at a Chicago convention, as was seen on Svengoolie’s TV show. Sven mispronounced Joe’s name, leading me to wonder if his not-so-secret identity, Rich Koz, has some history with Stanton phono cartridges. 😉
Denro has one of those official Dick Tracy watch replicas. It was a birthday gift from me, and I commissioned Joe to draw a custom card to go with it.
MeTV has posted this interview with Staton.
Denro and I first met Joe about fifty years ago. I’m not sure when I grabbed this sign from one of the Boston comic book events we attended long ago.
You won’t need Superman’s X-Ray vision to see who the bad guy is in Perry White’s office.
Hmm. I’m surprised I’d never heard of this. It’s a short feature called ‘The World of Comic Books’, from 1979.
