Mark Schultz

Mark Schultz has been cartooning and illustrating for more than 20 years. He is best known as the creator of the award-winning speculative adventure comic book, Xenozoic Tales, which has been adapted to television as the animated series, Cadillacs and Dinosaurs.

The first Xenozoic adventure originally appeared in the eighth issue of Kitchen Sinks Press’ anthology magazine, Death Rattle. Reader and critical response was positive, leading Kitchen Sink to offer Mark his own book — and Xenozoic Tales premiered in February of 1987.

Mark is also widely recognized for co-creating and co-writing SubHuman, an underwater adventure series, for Dark Horse Comics, and for scripting DC Comics’ Superman, Man of Steel for a five-year span. He has also written and/or drawn many other popular fictional icons, including Flash Gordon, Tarzan, the Spirit, Star Wars, Aliens and Predator. Currently, he writes the Prince Valiantnewspaper comic strip.

As an illustrator, Mark has depicted the adventures ofRobert E. Howard’s Conan of Cimmeria for the highly regarded Wandering Star/Del Rey editions of Howard’s works, and illustrated the autobiography of the famed painter of prehistoric life, Charles R. Knight.

He has written a DC Justice League novel, The Flash: Stop Motion, published by Pocket Books, and a science primer graphic novel titled The Stuff of Life: a Graphic Guide to Genetics and DNA for Hill and Wang.

He is in the process of finishing the illustrations to his cautionary novella, Storms At Sea, for Flesk Publications.

Born in 1955 near Philadelphia, and raised outside Pittsburgh, Mark at age 6 discovered both comics (Dell Comics’ Tarzan, and DC Comics’ Superman, Metal Men and Hawkman), and, through television broadcasts, classic adventure films, in particular King Kong and the Tarzan series. The stories of Edgar Rice Burroughs and Robert E. Howard further inspired him, as did the illustrators associated with them, especially Al Williamson, Roy Krenkel and Frank Frazetta.

Upon graduating from Kutztown State University in 1977, Mark devoted his career to producing commercial illustration until 1986, when a long-repressed desire to tell stories prevailed, leading to his submission of an eight page Xenozoic introductory tale to Kitchen Sink Press. Publisher Denis Kitchen showed interest in the concept and the first Xenozoic adventure appeared in the eighth issue of the anthology magazine, Death Rattle,in November of 1986. The first issue of Xenozoic Tales followed in February of 1987.

Mark’s artwork is strongly influenced by his love for classic American illustration and its roots. Some of the artists he admires and studies include Winslow Homer, Frank Schoonover, N.C. Wyeth, Daniel Smith, Dean Cornwell, Herbert Morton Stoops, F. R. Gruger and Hugh Ferris. Mark’s principle influences from within the comics field include: Hal Foster, Alex Raymond, Roy Crane, Will Eisner, Harvey Kurtzman, Wally Wood and Al Williamson.

He, his wife Denise and their two cats live in the mountains of northeastern Pennsylvania. For relaxation, Mark hikes, travels, watches old movies and tries to keep current with developments in the biological and physical sciences.