A painting by fantasy artist Frank Frazetta used as the cover art for a Conan the Barbarian novel will be auctioned next week and is already under off at $6 million.
The painting shows Conan the Cimmerian fighting Thak, an intelligent man-ape used as a bodyguard by Conan’s nemesis in the story.
The painting is the single lot in an auction at Heritage Auctions that is due to close on September 12. It has already attracted a bid of $6 million, which is $7.5 million with buyer’s premium.
The story, Rogues in the House, was written by Conan Creator Robert E Howard, and originally published in 1934 in Weird Tales magazine.
It was republished in several anthologies before its 1967 inclusion in Conan, a collection of seven stories by several authors.
The last Frazetta piece to hold the record, Dark Kingdom, shows his work at its best according to experts. Image courtesy of Heritage Auctions.
On the cover of this edition, by Lancer/Ace, was a 1966 painting by Frank Frazetta that was to become one of the archetypal images of Conan.
It’s dark, shocking, brooding, and violent.
Heritage Auctions say: “This quintessential image of Robert E. Howard’s famed barbarian is easily one of the (if not the) most desirable of Frazetta’s Conan-related covers, and one of the small handful of greatest paintings ever created by the towering artist.”
Frank Frazetta (1928 – 2010) was a New York-born artist who became one of the best-known fantasy and science-fiction painters and illustrators of the 20th century.
He is called the “Godfather of fantasy art” and is in the Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame, the Jack Kirby Hall of Fame, the Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame, the Science Fiction Hall of Fame, and received a Life Achievement Award from the World Fantasy Convention.
Frazetta’s paintings were used on the whole series of Lancer/Conan reissues, and have helped make them a lasting success.
Heritage say: “This imagery defined the character and was instrumental in making the Conan resurgence of the late 1960s a mass market success, which ultimately led to the Marvel Comics book series and the later series of feature films.”
This painting, usually known as Man Ape, is in oil on a 16″ by 20″ canvas-wrapped board.
Frank Frazetta’s work is collectible in both reproduction and original form.
In 2023, Heritage sold the original painting, Dark Kingdom from 1976 for $6 million. That was a record that confirmed an upward trend in Farzetta’s work.
In 2019, the painting Egyptian Queen was sold for $5.4 million, the previous record.
Death Dealer 6 auctioned for $1.7 million in 2018.
Already, Man Ape, is on the way to adding another peak to the chart.
