Frank Bellamy Checklist Website and Blog: ORIGINAL ART at Heritage.com: Thunderbirds

A friend pointed out that there are some lovely works available on Heritage auction site (2022 December 10 - 11 Comics & Comic Art Signature® Auction #7343) due to be available to bid on 20 November 2022. To quote Heritage, "Bidding Begins Approx.November 21st Monday with Auction Dates December 10th-11th Saturday-Sunday.

Get a free account, login and limit your search to "Original Art" and sit back with a large cup of your favourite beverage. There are three Frank Bellamy pieces, but also 5 Mike Noble, one Frank Langford and an anonymous piece of Green Hornet artwork. Though I love Mike Noble's artwork, we're here to highlight Frank Bellamy.

THUNDERBIRDS TV21 #80

"Thunderbirds", TV21 #80 pp.10-11

Heritage:

Frank Bellamy TV Century 21 #80 Thunderbirds Complete 2-Page Story Original Art (Century 21 Publications, 1966). This two-page spread from Part 8 of the "Atlantic Tunnel" story arc features the Thunderbirds team recurring villain, the Hood! The page also features TB-2 delivering the Mole, as well as TB-1. The 2-page episode was presented as a double-page spread created in ink and watercolor on illustration board with an image area of 25" x 16.25". The logo is hand-painted. All text is hand-lettered paste-up. Signed by Bellamy in the image area. In Excellent condition.

Firstly Bellamy didn't use watercolour on his comic artwork - but many people are fooled by his superb washes in inks. Secondly all the balloons and text panels will have been added to Bellamy's complete work - see my previous articles showing delivered artwork photographed by Bellamy here and here - but more importantly the "hand-painted" Thunderbirds logo. This will have been added onto Bellamy's finished artwork by the art staff of TV21 so I hope it's either the original pasted on lettering or a replica that someone has added. Also comparing the original and the comic it can be seen that the positioning is slightly different - perhaps the size is slightly different. So I think the artwork on Heritage has an added logo. Also notice the lack of pasted text panel at the start. There are also some other balloons that have moved from the published version - look at both the Hood's frames - and you'll see a text box missing.

I'd love to know what happened but nevertheless it looks in brilliant condition and I'm sure will sell for four figures.

A scanned page from TV21 #80

THUNDERBIRDS TV21 #88

"Thunderbirds" in TV21 #88, pp10-11

Heritage:

Frank Bellamy TV Century 21 #88 Thunderbirds Complete 2-Page Story Original Art (Century 21 Publications, 1966). This episode was Part 6 of the story arc "Solar Menace" and it features the TB-2, and the TB-3. The cliffhanger leaves Alan and Brains in a bad situation. The 2-page episode was presented as a double-page spread created in ink and watercolor on illustration board with an image area of 25" x 16.25". Signed by Bellamy in the image area. All text is hand-lettered paste-up. In Excellent condition.

Same thing about the watercolour.The most interesting thing for me is what's happened at the top left corner? Here's the original comic - the colours on this comic and the one above are a bit messy but I think you'll see what I'm seeing. Despite whatever has happened, the rest looks gorgeous!

A scanned page from TV21 #88

Bellamy never left that area blank and included some interesting backgrounds for the logo to be dropped in - in this case, more blue sky. But thankfully the rest does not appear to have faded - as can be seen by those rich blues which UV light loves to eat!

THUNDERBIRDS TV21 #156

"Thunderbirds" in TV21 #156, p.11

Heritage:

Frank Bellamy TV21 #156 Thunderbirds Story Page 2 Original Art (Century 21 Publications, 1968). Virgil Tracy is at the controls of Thunderbird-2 and valiantly searching for his brother Gordon in the missing aquatic Thunderbird-4. An exciting page with great layout and vibrant color work. Created in ink over watercolor on illustration board with an image area of 12" x 16.25". Signed by Bellamy in the image area. All text is hand-lettered paste-up. In Excellent condition.

Firstly this reminds me to say regarding the two images above Heritage usually give two views of artwork - 1) close up on the art itself and 2) a view of the whole board. In the piece above I'm showing the whole board version but the two double-page spreads above don't appear to have any more to show. Have they been trimmed back to the art? Unfortunately though, despite the "vibrant color work" I think this looks a bit faded.