Nightmare #9--Cover Recreation (Skywald)

Presented is one of my favorite non-Warren covers. I'm really not one who buys prelims, recreations, commissions and such in all but extremely rare instances. Now, as mentioned in my gallery explanation, Skywald original covers are seriously non-existent in the marketplace. There is a very big chance that the original Nightmare 9 cover is long gone. When I saw this pop up at Heritage, my first thought was---what the hell is that! I should've just read the description instead of hyperventilating...this is a masterful recreation by the original artist (of course). And although this painting which was done nearly 50 years after the original, it still takes my breathe away. It is not quite as sharp as the original---but many of the masters from the era are "different". Eyes are not the same---hands are not the same---but skill has improved! Again, this is not as fine brushed as the original--but the use of color and layers of such give the viewer a vision of of excellence. At a distance, it almost has a feel of an impressionistic style. Under magnification, the brush strokes and numerous colors/shades led me to want to pull back my earlier statement about eyes being less sharp as we age!!!