Neil,
Unfortunately, you are quite correct and it is no joke. If you happened
to be the owner of a very desirable Universal Horror piece in, say, only
"good" condition but mostly intact, today you actually could:
Tear the poster into four irregular pieces and send each one to a
different reputable highly-skilled restoration operation and ask them to
"restore your poster". It would be perfectly legal and not one of those
studios would question your motives or integrity. They would simply
perform the valuable service of taking the tragedy of a "badly damaged
vintage poster" and working their magic on it to "restore it to its
original glory".
It would cost you several thousand dollars at least, but in the end you
would have four identical posters, all in "perfect restored condition".
All of then considered legitimate 'originals' by the current standards
of this hobby. All four would look better than your single original did.
Ad you could keep one and sell/auction the other three for mega bucks.
so long as you took about years to introduce them to the market one at a
time. Even if the auction house or dealer did do the right thing and git
a signed and dated "opinion of authenticity" from a recognized expert in
the field before selling the posters, your 3 posters would each one be
authenticated as "genuine, with approximately 25% of original paper
intact and the rest professionally restored to original condition" or
some such double talk. After all, several experts on this have testified
that such a description is perfect correct and acceptable -- and such a
"restored" item might well be worth $23,000 or more.
It would all be legit... you'd make a ton of money... and you would
*still* have the poster in your own collection!
This is the sad state of affairs our beloved hobby-industry has brought
itself to. It's why I propose the community adopt an official standard
that no poster with less than 40% original paper can be called
"original" or "restored" -- it can only be called a "recreation" with
____% of original paper intact.
At least if we had such a standard, you would be limited to only
creating only two expensive "original restored" posters from your single
original. But, then again, since each of those two would have 50%
original paper, the one that you sold would probably go for twice as
much as those created from only 25% original paper, so you would still
make out big time. So, to be a truly effective 'standard' we would have
to insist on at least 60% original paper for a restored poster to still
be considered an "authentic, original poster with restoration."
Anybody see anything horribly wrong with this current situation?
-- JR
Neil Jaworski wrote:
it would seem to me, following many of these depressing threads, that
someone in possession of a valuable Universal 1sheet would be wise to
cut it in half, 'restore' each half and sell both copies of the poster.
are we at that point where the hobby is now comparable with those ebay
listings where you can buy a fragment of a fedora once worn by Frank
Sinatra for $50?
grim.
neil
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