Gil Elvgren's Thinking Of You Brings $209,000 At Heritage Auctions

More records shattered; including two Patrick Nagel paintings at $161,000 each, in $2.1 million Pin-up and Pulp Illustration Art auction on May 7

DALLAS — Gil Elvgren's sultry but sweet portrait titled Thinking of You (Retirement Plan) sold for $209,000 to lead a record setting selection of pin-up art in Heritage Auctions' May 7 Illustration Art Signature Auction in Beverly Hills. The $2.1 million auction set multiple artists records including a new high for contemporary artist Patrick Nagel, as two works sold for $161,000 each.

"Pin-up art was strong across the board," said Todd Hignite, Vice President of Heritage Auctions. "Illustration art in general remains extremely popular with collectors but the interest in Gil Elvgren's work — and that of other giants — is simply outpacing all expectations."

Collector interest for Nagel's work has placed him squarely in the pantheon of the 20^th centuries most popular illustration artists as (Untitled) Her Look, 1983, and Untitled (Woman with Horse), 1983, each sold for $161,000, surpassing the artist's previous record, also set by Heritage. Paintings by Nagel secured four of the auctions' top 10 most valuable lots with Profiles of a Man and Woman, 1983, brought $56,250 and Partial Nude, The Playboy Forum illustration, May 1984, ended at $31,250.

The remaining top lots were dominated by Elvgren's classic pin-up paintings produced for Brown & Bigelow, including A Real Stopper (Now I'll do the Whistling), which sold for $68,750, and Captivating, which hammered for $53,125. A Refreshing Lift, painted in the 1970s, sold for $46,875, and Worth Cultivating (A Nice Crop), sold for $37,500.

Pulp and paperback art also generated strong results as Doll of Death, the Spicy Mystery pulp cover from August 1938 by Hugh Joseph Ward sold for $37,500. Margaret Brundage's shocking The Blue Woman, the September 1935 cover of Weird Tales, sold for $20,625 and Lizards from Hell, Will Hulsey's outrageous February 1957 cover for True Men Stories, brought more than eight times its estimate to end at $17,500. The April 1940 cover painting to Fantastic Adventures magazine, titled The Blue Tropics and painted by Frank R. Paul, sold for $15,000. A strong selection of paperback cover art was led by the fantastical Dark of the Woods, 1970, by Jeffrey Jones, which hammered for $20,000.

Original ad art performed well as Gil Elvgren's A Cool Beverage, a preliminary beer advertisement, blasted its $8,000 estimate out of the water to end at $22,500, while George Petty's art deco infused original "They All Say Yes," a probably Atlas beer advertisement, sold for $5,937.

Additional highlights include, but are not limited by:

Beauty in a White Dress with Rose, Brown & Bigelow calendar illustration by Al Buell. Sold: $22,500.

Flat Tire, The Saturday Evening Post cover, Nov. 24, 1962, by Jan. B. Balet. Sold: $18,750.

Hi-Heel Beauties, EYEFUL magazine cover, February 1947, by Peter Driben. Sold: $17,500.

Weyr Search, Analog Science Fiction and Fact magazine cover, October 1967, by John Schoenherr. Sold: $15,000.