The above is an unpublished drawing by the late Jack Kirby. There are a lot of unpublished Kirby originals floating around these days, many of which were even drawn by Jack. But a number of them were not.
In a few cases, there are innocent (or perhaps, wishful) misidentifications. A drawing looks something like Kirby did it…and since it would be worth more if he did than if he didn't, the possessor says, "Boy, that sure looks like Kirby to me." Or sometimes, they hedge the i.d. by saying, "Oh, this is a Kirby layout that someone else finished." With a very few exceptions, this is not the case. After about 1960, which is when most of the surviving art dates from, Jack did almost no layouts for other artists that weren't finished, published and properly credited. The exceptions are few, far between and not likely to turn up in the original art market.
Increasingly, I am seeing what I believe are outright forgeries showing up there. I'm talking about pages that Mr. Kirby never actually did but which are being marketed as if they're off his drawing board. Usually, they are tracings of things he did do, or sometimes composite tracings — the head from one sketch traced onto a tracing of the body of another sketch. Often, they are represented as preliminary roughs or cases where Jack drew a cover, decided something was amiss, and then redrew the same scene for what became the published version. This is also something Jack almost never did. Last year, a devout Kirby fan paid more than two grand for what was represented as Jack's first, still-in-pencil attempt at the cover of Captain America #100. No, it wasn't. It was just someone's tracing — and not a very good one — of the one drawing Jack did for the front of that issue.
I believe I know the source of a few of these fakes. There's a gentleman (I'm using that noun loosely) who worked briefly in the comic book industry back in the seventies — and when I say "briefly," I mean briefly. I think he got around three actual credits, though he occasionally worked as an assistant to other, more established artists. Most comic fans reading this would not know his name. Around '76, seeking ghost/assistant work, he mailed Jack a portfolio of sample pages…and every panel in them was traced from published Kirby art. Jack had no interest in having anyone assist him and if he had, a swiper of his earlier drawings was the last guy he'd have hired, so the offer was politely declined. But I did see the samples and noticed a certain odd misreading of Kirby technique and a very different pencil texture. I think I'm seeing that same misreading and texture in some of the fake Kirby drawings currently making the rounds, at least one of which I know the buyer purchased directly from this artist.
I see a lot of fakes because people keep coming to me with alleged Kirby art that they wish to have authenticated…and I'm thinking of adopting a "no comment" policy and refusing to get involved. It's always a pain, especially when someone e-mails a blurry, low-res scan and says, "If I don't hear from you in 12 hours, I'm going to assume it's real and buy it." Yes, someone actually did that and no, I didn't get back to him in time. (What I would have told him was that I couldn't be certain based on what he'd sent.)
Worse, a gent in Europe recently purchased — for about thrice the money it would have been worth if authentic — a "Kirby" drawing that blind aborigines could spot as bogus. He mailed me a stat and asked me to sign a Certificate of Authenticity stating that I, as Jack's one-time assistant, swore that the attached drawing was Kosher and Kirby. I broke it to him gently that he'd been had and received in return, a flurry of angry accusations: I'm lying, I'm too stupid to recognize real Jack Kirby artwork, I'm in cahoots with some guy I've never heard of who's offered to buy the putative drawing cheap since it cannot be authenticated, etc.
Like I said, I may stop answering such questions but in the meantime, I'm putting out the word: There are fake Kirby drawings out there and their number is increasing. Actually, there are a lot of fake drawings and autographs attributed to all the "high ticket" comic artists. There's a gent on eBay who, though I've e-mailed him to stop, insists on selling Groo promotional cards with phony Sergio Aragonés autographs — this, despite the fact that real Sergio signatures are about as rare as hydrogen molecules. Counterfeit Charles Schulz sketches are especially becoming a booming cottage industry.
Oh — and I should also mention one other category of misrepresented Kirby art. Sometimes, an artist — primarily one who worked with Jack like Joe Sinnott, Dick Ayers or Mike Royer — will be engaged to do a "re-creation," taking an old Kirby drawing, tracing it and inking it. That is legitimate, and they usually sign the piece in some way to indicate that Jack never actually touched that piece of paper. Once in a while, owners will erase the line that denotes re-creation or somehow suggest the artwork started with a Kirby pencil drawing actually pencilled by Kirby. There is one former Kirby inker who has been known to find a published Kirby drawing (usually something obscure), trace and ink it, sign the drawing with both their names and tell the buyer, "Years ago, Jack gave me this sketch to ink." An acknowledged re-creation is okay but this is not.
So the moral of this story is to be careful. The supply of Jack Kirby art is finite but there's no end to how many forgeries can be produced.