Oliver Frey (1948- 2022) seemingly led a double life, the Swiss artist, who was based in the United Kingdom was well known for his book and magazine illustrations, especially for British computer magazines of the 1980s but under the pen name Zack, he became known for his erotic illustrations and erotic comics in gay male porn magazines of the 1970s and 1980s. It was first as a young man in Britain that he first discovered comics and was inspired to become an artist. His family later moved back to Switzerland, but after doing his national service in the Swiss Army and dropping out of Berne University, “Oli” returned to Britain to study at the London Film School, where he supported himself working as a freelance comic artist. As “Zack”, Frey pushed the boundaries of UK obscenity law at the time, bordering on (or directly crossing into ) hardcore imagery which resulted in not only raised eyebrows but subjected him to police raids where entire stocks of the magazine were destroyed. Ha work still technically illegal due to the wording of the laws that had only partially legalised gay sex. Some of his less explicit gay work bears his real name and he never actually tried to keep his adult work a secret – it’s just that the two worlds of “gay” and “straight “ cartooning were kept very separate. The gay erotic art was the subject of an exhibition at the British Library in 2014 – giving it a degree of establishment respectability. Frey died aged 74 in 2022, survived by his long term partner Roger Kean.

Peter Johnson photographed by Bruce Weber, 1999

Photographer: Anthony Gayton

“Pussycat, pussycat

You're delicious and if my wishes can all come true

I'll soon be kissing your sweet little pussycat lips

Pussycat, pussycat, I love you, yes, I do”

Painter: Denman Waldo Ross (1853-1935) “Edmund C. S. Bigelow” 1916

Jon on Remsen Street Roof  -  c.1967. Colored Crayons on Blue Paper. 

The Morgan Library and Museum,NYC

Paul Cadmus   1904-1999 

Brendan Fraser for Premiere Magazine, 1998.