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Michael Jackson secretarial (?) photo sold for $7600 at Christie's

Well needless to say, I was shocked, for more than one reason, when I found this auction result. Now I know that Michael Jackson autographed items can sell for a lot of money. However, I was surprised that an 8x10 signed MJ photo would sell for £4750 or $7600. Second, the fact that this style, I believe, has been identified as a secretarial obviously makes it even more surprising. And finally, the fact that this possible secretarial was sold at one of the most famous auction houses in the world, Christie's, makes it jaw-dropping.

The auction took place on November 29, 2012, and there are pics below.

So am I right? Is this a secretarial signature? And if so, how did Christie's make such a huge blunder? Even if it's not a secretarial, the price realized is crazy. $2000 I think would be plenty high enough.

And how does this make you feel about buying from even well-established, seemingly reputable auction houses?

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Permalink Reply by Paul on October 3, 2015 at 10:56pm

They should have had a quick opinion from aml members. Large amount of money.

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Permalink Reply by wascher on October 4, 2015 at 1:16am

Back in 2012 that was not considered a high price. We have quite a few discussions already on the forum discussing some of these (before you joined the forum James)

Heres a fun one, a drawing using an MJ secretarial autograph. The drawing sold for $3,509.00 here at Gotta Have Rock And Roll on Mar 11, 2010

And since that one made this forger a profit, this one was sent off to Juliens to sell. It sold for $5,625.00 at Juliens on 6/24/2010 .

These are both Erick McKay's, before he realized there was a secretarial autograph.

Wendy Christine posted this discussion back in Jan 2013, which gives you just a glimpse of questionable MJ items from Juliens alone.

http://live.autographmagazine.com/group/michael-jackson-autographs-...

No matter where you buy - big auction-house or not, you need to do your homework.

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Permalink Reply by wascher on October 4, 2015 at 6:47am

http://www.ebay.com/itm/271998298471 (and another one was just sent to me to share- thx P)

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Permalink Reply by James on October 4, 2015 at 8:39am

Well said! Thanks for the pics, Wascher. I'm pretty sure Michael would not be happy about all of this misrepresentation of himself. Plus, I'm sure he could have done better!