DALLAS — The world can’t get enough of Spider-Man.
Not only does everyone’s favorite web-slinging superhero have a movie blockbuster with Spider-Man: No Way Home, he now is responsible for the world’s most valuable page of original comic book artwork.
Drawn by Mike Zweck, Page 25 from 1984’s Secret Wars No. 8, which tells the origin story of Spider-Man’s iconic black costume, sold for $3.36 million Thursday at Heritage Auctions, shattering all previous comic art records.
Original art of Page 25 from 1984’s Secret Wars No. 8 sells at auction for $3.36 million.
Courtesy Heritage Auctions
Marvel Comics’ Secret Wars might have been created to sell toys, but this week it forever altered the comic-art landscape, as Page 24 from the same book sold moments earlier for $288,000.
That’s $3,648,000 total. For two pages of art from one 1980s comic book.
“Today’s results prove what we’ve long been saying: Comic book art is as beloved and valuable as anything put on canvas.” said Joe Mannarino, Heritage Auctions’ New York Director of Comics & Comic Art.
Moments later, the Dallas-based auction house sold one of the few surviving copies of Action Comics No. 1 for $3,180,000. That makes this CGC Fine 6.0 copy of Superman’s debut the second-most-expensive comic ever offered by the auction house, behind only the finest-known copy of Spider-Man’s first web-sling through Amazing Fantasy No. 15, which sold for $3.6 million last year to become the world’s most valuable comic book sold at auction.
It’s also the most expensive copy of Action Comics No. 1 ever sold by an auction house.
The comic book debut of Superman, Action Comics No. 1, sold for $3.18 million at Heritage.
Courtesy Heritage Auctions
Those were but two highlights from the first session of Heritage’s Jan. 13-16 Comics & Comic Art Signature® Auction — a session that realized $12,990,840 in just 90 minutes.
Here, too, was a new auction record for the legendary artist and comics creator Steve Ditko. His splash page from 1966’s Amazing Spider-Man No. 37, which featured the first named appearance of Norman Osborn (the Green Goblin, natch), sold Thursday for $336,000.
Dave Cockrum likewise reached a new auction record, as his action-packed, star-studded original cover for 1977’s X-Men No. 107 opened bidding at $80,000, only to spark a bidding war that drove the final price to $360,000.
The star-studded original cover art for 1977’s X-Men No. 107 sold for $360,000.
Courtesy Heritage Auctions
Not so far behind, Ed Hannigan and Klaus Janson’s original cover for Marvel’s G.I. Joe No. 21 sold for $312,200. The title character might be the Real American Hero in this book from 1984, but it was Snake-Eyes making his solo cover debut who stole the show here.
This first session also included another million-dollar-plus comic book: a CGC Very Good+ 4.5 copy of Detective Comics No. 27. Batman’s debut shows up at auction as infrequently as Superman’s first flight, which explains why this copy sold Thursday for $1,140,000.
It should not come as a surprise that Spider-Man’s black costume is now responsible for the most expensive work of original comic art. The two pages from Secret Wars that tell the backstory of this living outfit — this symbiote, in the parlance of True Believers — also changed the course of Spider-Man, as the black costume slowly morphed into the villain (and anti-hero) known as Venom. And until Thursday, they had never before been available to the public.
Ed Hannigan and Klaus Janson’s original cover, featuring Snake-Eyes, for Marvel’s G.I. Joe No. 21 sold for $312,200.
Courtesy Heritage Auctions
The Action Comics No. 1 that sold Thursday was known as the “Rocket Copy” of Superman’s 1938 first flight, given the playful moniker because of the red spaceship stamped on its cover by its first — and, until Thursday, only — owner, whose family kept the historic issue in an envelope meant to preserve important documents. This book is as consequential as it gets: Action Comics No. 1 is the palladium title of the Golden Age, the book in which Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster introduced readers to Clark Kent and Lois Lane and ushered in the Era of the Superhero.
Certified Guarantee Company knows of only 77 copies of Action Comics No. 1 in existence in any condition and of just two graded CGC FN 6.0 — one of which is this copy full of white pages. Well before Thursday’s live auction, collectors made it abundantly clear they were prepared to tussle over this extraordinarily vibrant example: Shortly after the auction launched in the hours before Christmas Eve, bidding on the comic book — and rocket-ship stamp itself, included with the book — rocketed past the $1.5 million mark. Bidding had surpassed the $1.9 million mark just hours before live bidding began
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