Mark Schultz is a comics artist best know for his creation Xenozoic Tales, otherwise known as Cadillacs and Dinosaurs, which first appeared in the eighth issue of Death Rattle, a black and white horror anthology comic from Kitchen Sink Press, in the 80’s.

The story was so successful that Schultz went on to produce 14 issues of Xenozoic Tales, many of which were collected into a pair of trade paperbacks from Dark Horse Comics, and several others were published by Kitchen Sink Press. The feature was also made into an animated TV cartoon called Cadillacs and Dinosaurs in the early 90’s.

Schultz draws the aforementioned Cadillacs, and especially dinosaurs, with beautifully rendered pen and ink line and hatching. In addition he draws wonderful lost civilizations, elaborate palaces, beautiful characters and fantastic landscapes.

Initially, Schultz seemed very heavily influenced by Wally Wood, (something I know all too much about ). At some point he was introduced to the beautiful comics work of Al Williamson, and his artistic hero, Alex Raymond, as well as Hal Foster, contemporary of Raymond and one of Wood’s great influences.

It’s fascinating to look through the Xenozoic Tales stories in sequence. Schultz isn’t afraid to wear his influences on his sleeve as he goes through a period of studying the characteristics of these great comics artists, digesting the parts he likes and absorbing those techniques into the developing whole of his own work. Recently, he has shown the influence great pen and ink illustrators like Joseph Clement Coll and Franklin Booth.

I saw some of his original pages for Xenozoic Tales at a comics convention several years ago, and they were rendered at an unbelievable level of detail, including details that you can’t even see in the printed comics.

A book of Schultz’s drawings has been published by Flesk Publications, a terrific small publisher who has also done superb collections of the work of Joseph Clement Coll and Franklin Booth, and has announced new collections of the work of illustrator and realist painter James Bama (who did those wonderful Doc Savage paperback covers), illustrator Bob Peake and contemporary comics artist Steve Rude (see my post on Steve Rude), as well as a second volume of work by Mark Schultz.

There are several trade paperback editions of the Xenozoic Tales stories: Xenozoic Tales Vol 1 After The End TP, Xenozoic Tales Vol 2 The New World TP, Dinosaur Shaman: Nine Tales from the Xenozoic Age, Scenes from the Xenozoic Age, and some under the title Cadillacs and Dinosaurs and Time in Overdrive.

Michael J. Ryan’s Paleoblog has a nice review of the Flesk book of Schultz drawings.

There in no official site for Mark Schultz as far as I know, so the link below points to the gallery on the Flesk Publications site. Schultz also writes comic books and is currently writing the Prince Valiant newspaper strip.

The Flesk site also includes an interview with Schultz.