Fred Carter 1938 - 2022

 

Religious comic book artist Fred Carter passed away on May 8, 2022 at the age of 83. 

Best known for his long association with the Jack Chick religious tracts, or religious comic books, Jack's work was usually unsigned. He worked for Jack Chick from the 1970s until his death. 

Some quotes via DailyCartoonist:

From the Jack Chick Tract Museum Facebook page:

It is our sad duty to report that Fred Carter, the phenomenal artist who drew many of Chick’s tracts and all of The Crusaders comic books (as well as nearly 360 paintings for the “The Light of the World” film) passed away today from a lingering illness. Fred was also a minister as well as an artist… He worked for Chick from the early 1970s up until his death.

From Christianity Today:

He was the close collaborator of Jack Chick, pioneer of the popular evangelistic cartoons known as Chick Tracts. According to Christian Comics International, more than half of Chick Tracts were drawn by Carter.

His life changed in the early 1970s when a friend at church showed him something he had picked up in Chicago: a Chick Tract. It was most likely This Was Your Life or A Demon’s Nightmare, the most popular two titles from the newly founded Chick Publications. Though the style was wildly different than Carter’s—with simply drawn, slightly shaded figures—the 32- or 33-year-old Christian artist felt a thrill of recognition.

“I had always wanted to use art in a Christian setting,” he later said. “I saw it and it impressed me because that’s what I always wanted to do.”

Carter sent Chick a letter and some of his artwork. He moved to California in 1972 and started drawing tracts. A company photo from the following year shows a staff of 19 people. Carter was the only Black person.

“Carter had real chops as a draftsman, fashion sense, & an eye for drama,” Fred Sanders, theology professor at Biola University, wrote on Twitter. “His output was so thoroughly aligned with, & carried along by, Jack Chick’s own project that I can’t tell a bit of difference in their theologies.”