Hugh Joseph Ward’s The Evil Flame, a Spicy Mystery Stories pulp cover, from The Estate of John McLaughlin, with an auction price of $143,400. lead the auction’s $2.591 million in offerings. It is the highest price ever realized at public auction for a pulp magazine cover.
From Heritage:
"This painting was not only the most important Ward pulp cover we've ever offered,” said Ed Jaster, Senior Vice President of Heritage, “it's one of the absolute best pulp covers that exists, by any artist, as reflected by the price paid for it. It has all the hallmarks of the greatest pulp covers: sexual tension, violence, a gorgeous woman in danger, all aggressively painted in a way that can’t help but to catch the eye.”
- Date: August 1936 Cover
- Auction Date: August 2010
- Oil on canvas
- Size: 28.5" x 19.5"
- Signed lower right
- Auction Price: $143,400.*
