DALLAS, TX.- Thirty-seven years ago Gary Colabuono saw his first ashcan. “And I did not know what they were,” he says now, decades after he began collecting, preserving and promoting these cheaply made, stapled-together black-and-white mock-ups made to secure a comic book title’s trademark and meant to be tossed into the trash.
In time, Colabuono became the expert on these lost rarities from the earliest days of the comic-book industry. Now, four of his ashcans – including one of two surviving Superman Comics ashcans from 1939 – head to market for the first time during Heritage Auctions’ history-making April 7-10 Comics & Comic Art Signature® Auction.
“Gary has been a close friend of mine for nearly 30 years, and I am extraordinarily grateful to be offering these on his behalf,” says Heritage Auctions Senior Vice President Ed Jaster. “I have no doubt the market will reward him for his decades of impeccable stewardship of these treasures.”
Colabuono’s collection, and his essays about ashcans, have appeared in numerous history books, among them the essential Comics Between the Panels and DC Comics’ 75th anniversary treasury The Art of Modern Mythmaking. The author of DC’s history, its former president Paul Levitz, even inscribed Colabuono’s copy with a thank-you note: “To Gary, without whom there’d be no pages 96-97, and so much less fun in the world of comics!”
But in 1985 he only knew of the ashcans’ significance due to their provenance.
“Because they came from the retired president of DC Comics Sol Harrison, I knew these were items of historical importance,” Colabuono says. “There was Wonder Woman on a white cover, and I had never seen something like this. I was like, ‘What am I looking at?’ Same with Superman Comics, with its black-and-white cover art from Action Comics No. 7. And I kept wondering: ‘What is this?’
“I was a history minor in college, so I started doing the research. At the beginning there was just a curiosity. There was no market. Nobody knew about them. It took a while for me to understand all this. I was friends with Paul Levitz, and I am the only guy who got to go into DC’s archives and do all this research.”
DALLAS, TX.- The first issue of Captain America Comics, which introduced super soldier Steve Rogers, his sidekick Bucky and their Nazi nemesis Red Skull, sold nearly 1 million copies upon its publication at the beginning of 1941. But few copies Captain America Comics No. 1 are in better condition today than the one that serves as a centerpiece offering in Heritage Auctions’ superpowered April 7-10 Comics & Comic Art Signature® Auction.
The copy of Cap’s debut featured in the April auction hails from the historic San Francisco Pedigree Collection and bears a grade of Near Mint 9.4 from Certified Guaranty Company. It’s the finest copy Heritage Auctions has offered in two decades.
Yet that platinum piece from comicdom’s Golden Age isn’t the lone Cap capstone available in this auction.
For the first time at auction, here, too, is the entirety of Captain America’s first solo Silver Age story – all 10 pages of original art, offered separately, from August 1964’s Tales of Suspense No. 59. This is the only time in 20 years when every single page of a truly key Silver Age story has been offered for sale at the same time.
“We couldn’t dream up two better auction lots if we tried,” says Heritage Auctions Vice President Barry Sandoval. “It’s the best of the Golden Age meets the best of the Silver Age bound up in the red, white and blue of one of comics’ most beloved characters – a near-mint copy of one of the most important comics ever from one of the most famous pedigreed collections, and the fresh-to-the-market original art of a story everyone remembers.”
It doesn’t get more historic than this: “Stan Lee, Author. Jack Kirby, Illustrator.”
CHICAGO: Serious collectors inspired by the 2021 blockbuster group exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, "Chicago Comics; 1960 Until Now!", curated by Dan Nadel, are searching comic books stores, indie sellers and online to learn more about the first indie Black Age, Rhythmistic Future-Primitif character created and published by ONLI Studios LLC in 1981. Due to its limited edition low press-run this book s a rare special find. It was created and published by a Black owned operation. splash page from that original image was featured mural sized on the outer wall of the MCA during the exhibition.
The entire original "NOG" story was featured in the 2021 Top 20 Graphic Novels New York Times listed, "It's Life As I See It", anthology by Dan Nadel.
Add to this that Turtel Onli coined the genre term, "The Black Age of Comics" in 1993 to expand the industry with a celebration of creators, concepts and products derived from the indie, Black, African or Urban experience.
ONLI STUDIOS LLC still produces events and publishes its influential line of Future-Primitif Rhythmistic Graphic Novels & Comix.
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