Wetering Portrait

Here's a very fine portrait I acquired by the artist Johannes Embrosius van de Wetering de Rooij (1877-1972). Wetering was born in Woudrichem in the Netherlands and studied art in The Hague and eventually obtained a royal grant. He is most known for his landscapes and water scenes, which makes this portrait quite rare. In fact, the highest auction record I could find for him was not a landscape but instead a scene of people reading on a terrace. (click for larger image)

A photograph of Wetering in his studio.

Animal Farm

Picked up a terrific museum-quality painting that I am really excited about. It's oil on wood panel. The painting is not signed, and I have no idea who the artist is. I do know that the artist was incredibly skilled - the details are just stunning. Looks like a Dutch farm perhaps. I had originally estimated the date around 1940's - 1950's, but I was able to dig up a little information that shed some light on this piece.

The label on the back lists Borst and Clausen as the framer out of Manhattan in New York. I did a little research and Borst opened his shop in NY in 1886. In July of 1890, Borst retires and Clausen takes over the shop. Not sure how long the company stayed in business after that, but it seems this painting dates to the turn of the century - maybe 1910 or so. I'll have to do a little more digging on this one, so for now, I'll just enjoy looking at it! (click for larger image)

H. Loveland Hawaiian Shore

Got this nice seascape in recently dated 1941 by an H. Loveland. I have not been able to find any info on the artist yet, but according to the label on the back, it is entitled "Hawaiian Seas". The label also reads "Association of Honolulu Artists", and finally a price of $50. It's going to need some cleaning as it has yellowed quite a bit, and there is some very minor paint loss that will need touching up, but otherwise a real nice painting. (click for larger image)

Fantastic Four 266 Cover

In all my years of comic art collecting, there has only been one piece I have regretted selling - this cover. Well, after it being absent from my collection for several years, it is finally back!

The story goes back a few years - another comic art collector friend and I were discussing John Byrne's Fantastic Four years, and we decided to choose our favorite covers. Our choices were very different, and somehow this cover came out as my top choice - a classic image that I fell in love with as soon as I saw the original comic book back in the mid-80's. He said "I bet you could find that one", and with his encouragement, I contacted a dealer friend to inquire if he knew where it might be (he being the guru of all things Byrne). Turns out he knew exactly where it was; at HIS house! Shortly thereafter, we made a deal and it was mine. I won't go into the foolish reasoning that got me to sell it after that, but suffice to say, I regretted it. Well, I was happy to right that wrong recently and get this baby home again.

This cover, depicting The Invisible Woman, The Thing, and Charisma, is done entirely in marker, which is typical for this period of Byrne art. One thing of note - the figures are HUGE on this cover - probably the largest figures on any of the covers he did during his stint on the Fantastic Four. I actually did the overlay on this cover the first time I owned it, since none of the lettering is actually on the art. I also tweaked the scan in Photoshop - the lettering is quite white compared to the paper stock of the art. I'm going to re-do the overlay and match the color with the paper stock. (click for larger image)

If you want to read more about this cover, John Byrne's run on the Fantastic Four, and my chase of John Byrne art, check out some of my CFA-APA articles (link).

Di Angelo Painting

Just got a new painting in and I am loving it. Probably dates from the late 40's, early 50's and is signed Di Angelo. Very nicely painted image of people strolling through a market. It has a beautiful hand painted frame with a very interesting old label on the back that says "Artistic Framing, Bloomingdales NY". I'll have to do some research on this one... (click for larger image)

Did a little research and it looks like this is the Italian artist Pasquale D'Angelo (1896 - 1955). The seller told me it was from the 30's, which makes sense given the artists life span. I found a very similar work by the artist of an alley scene that was probably done about the same time as this painting, and even looks like the same city.

Dark Knight Returns Production Page

I've been seeing some of these production pages on ebay lately, and thought I'd pick one up. Not exactly sure of their origins, but they appear to be printers proofs of some kind, and may have been distributed with anniversary copies of the DKR TPB. They consist of two layers; one is the color art (computer printout), and the other is a clear overlay containing the black and white line art. I took some time and created another overlay that contains the lettering so you can actually read the page (click for larger image). Coincidentally, this page immediately follows the original page that I own from the book.

Fantastic Four 253 2 Page Sequence

UPDATE: SOLD IN 2011!

Another killer couple of pages from FF 253. Featuring all four of the FF, a "Flame On!", Sue using her powers, and some really cool aliens. Love the inking on these pages! Classic stuff!! (click for larger image)