A native of Leominster, Massachusetts, Erik P. Carter was trained in virology to prepare him for his day job in vaccine research, but outside of that important endeavor he also manages to explore figurative oil painting in exquisite fashion. Citing Caravaggio and Francis Bacon as inspirations, Carter’s work is gorgeously Baroque and sumptuously moody, with light and shadow playing a dramatic duet. Since 2019 he’s had several exhibitions (mostly in Boston and Philadelphia) in which he intertwines themes of religious history and homoerotic beauty for a combustible and captivating collection of work. There is something poignant and lonely about his art – a quiet stillness that simultaneously exists with an intensity that finds its tension in the sinewy muscles of human flesh, and the ever-approaching possibility of destruction. If it seems we favor artists for Dazzler of the Day, it is not in your imagination. Check out his website here for a powerful view of his work.
