Forbidden Zone Magazine

Forbidden Zone was a glossy 106 page color (mostly) comics magazine published in 1999. It was founded by editor Horatio Weisfeld (formally of Penthouse Comix) and artist Arthur Suydam (Marvel Zombies).
Forbidden Zone was conceived and designed to present new trademark characters and compete with Heavy Metal Magazine on American newsstands and Penthouse Comix in foreign markets. Forbidden Zone published only one issue but this was packed with a remarkable lineup of internationally famous comic book and fantasy art talent, including: Simon Bisley, Richard Corben, Arthur Suydam, Joe Linsner. This made the issue (along with the premiere issues of Creepy in the 60s and Penthouse Comix in the early 1990s) a virtual assembly of its era's top comic book artists. The issue was also the first mass-market publication to present artwork by illustrator/production designer/ video director Dan Ouellette who has since been the subject several books and many gallery shows.
Additional artwork was contributed by Bob Fingerman, and Floyd Hughes (who is presently head of the illustration department at the Pratt Institute). The frontispiece was of James Dean by celebrity artist Sebastian Krüger. The inclusion of radical-modern illustration talent like Krüger and Ouellette along side such well known comics talent as Bisley, Suydam, Corben and Linsner marked Forbidden Zone Magazine as an attempt, albeit a short lived one, to create something different in mass-market fantasy art culture. The magazine is also notable for being one of the few attempts by American magazine publishers to bring adult non-super hero comics to the newsstand market.
The first issue of Forbidden Zone Magazine printed 100,000 copies and was distributed across the United States. Before publication of the first issue, Forbidden Zone Magazine's corporate parent sank into (tech-bubble) fatal financial trouble and so the second issue, although partially completed by Weisfeld and Suydam, was never published.

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