Thursday, September 8, 2011

TIGRA



Above is the splash page to Giant-Size Creatures #1 [Marvel; July
1974], the story in which I turned Greer Nelson, formerly known as
the Cat, into Tigra the Mis-Named Were-Woman.  Technically, “were-
woman” means “man-woman” and, while that might have been a pretty
groundbreaking comic, that wasn’t what I was going for.  Werewolf.
Were-woman. It made perfect sense to editor-in-chief Roy Thomas and
me at the time.

The image above comes from the original art to that landmark page.
My son Eddie took it down to the UPS Store and made a reduced-size
copy of the original art.  I scanned that reduced copy to give you
a look at the page.

Looking at my upcoming convention appearances and considering the
expense of my attending those events, factoring in that a pair of
parsimonious publishers are playing “Hollywood bookkeeping” games
with royalties they owe me, I’m going to be offering this page on
eBay to cover my convention expenses.  But, before I put the page
on eBay, I’m offering members of a comics art mailing list and my
readers here the chance to bid on it first.

Because I only have two splash pages of stories I’ve written...and
because this is such a key Bronze Age page...I am not going to sell
it for less than $1500.  I think it’s worth more. 

If you are interested in purchasing this page of original art, you
can e-mail your offer to me here.  This pre-bidding
will continue until Tuesday, September 13.  The page will go to the
highest bidder who has bid at least $1500.  If no one bids $1500,
then it’ll go on eBay where that price will be the minimum selling
price.  If I sell the page via this pre-eBay auction, I’ll absorb
the insurance and shipping charges.

The page will come with a signed certificate of authenticity that
proclaims it comes from my Vast Accumulation of Stuff.  I think the
certificate is cool and funny.  If I have masted Blogger as well I
think I have, a scan of the certificate appears here:


Let the bidding begin!

I’ll be back tomorrow with more stuff. 

© 2011 Tony Isabella

6 comments:

  1. By the way, my son Eddie has posted a few items on eBay for me:

    http://www.ebay.com/sch/tonyisa/m.html?_trksid=p4340.l2562

    ReplyDelete
  2. Mr. Isabella,

    I can't bid on your piece (I can't buy a gallon of gas, today), but I firmly believe that this page is worth more than this (Tigra, Werewolf, cool looking Hydra image, even before the historical worth). I wish you'd make sure you have it "out" into multiple sites in the aether for longer than 5 days. -- I've sold some pretty high-end pieces this year, and I can't imagine a dealer wouldn't sell this for 4500. While I realize you're not a dealer, you should still get half that. Just sayin' Thanks for the years of entertainment. Jeffrey Stackhouse

    ReplyDelete
  3. I am withdrawing this Tigra page at this time. This is based on no one showing any actual "here's an offer" interest in the page at this time. There was lots of prior interest from six different individuals who all clearly wanted to be the only buyer I offered the page to, but not even any of them have bid.

    So...the pre-eBay auction is over and there won't be an eBay auction any time soon. I was on the fence about selling this page anyway. Maybe this is a sign I should hang on to it for now.

    Sorry if this disappoints anyone.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hi Tony! I know this is a very old post and you prob won't see this but by chance do you know where this splash is? I'm interested in acquiring it. Thanks, Paul

    ReplyDelete
  5. I sold this page several years ago to a dealer. Hated to do it, but I had bills to pay.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Wait? You were one of the minds behind Tigra?

    ReplyDelete