Ekphrasis: Vampires Edition – Lazy & Entitled

“A strangeness. A ripple of unease…A sense that there was a reason to watch one’s back when shadows grew long.” – Isabel Cañas, ‘Vampires of El Norte’

Hey look, it’s the last of the first crop of ekphrasis for the new website! If you’re unfamiliar with this series, basically, I take five pictures and write a one-paragraph response to them. This is three out of three for this summer.

Quick note up top: back on Substack, alt text would auto populate from Wikimedia Commons. It seems to not do that here. I apologize for not adding alt text previously, I didn’t realize it wasn’t there.

This week, as I said in the title, we’re still only a few months out from both Nosferatu and Sinners. Let’s do vampires.

Look At Them Bat Wings

screenshot from a 1915 movie about vampires in which a woman in a black bodysuit and a black head covering and black bat wings towers over a cowering woman in white — credit: Wikimedia Commons, Louis Feuillade

I don’t know anything about I vampiri film, the 1915 movie from which this is taken. I have to imagine this is where we got both Batman and Catwoman from, Bob Kane and Bill Finger seeing an Italian vampire movie and thinking “but whaddya figure her parents were like?” When are we getting a vampire movie where some blood-sucking vixen wears bat wings as part of her personal style? Why couldn’t Nadja from WWDITS have worn bat wings?

What’s a Vampire Story Without A Guy Carrying His Passed-Out Girlfriend At Some Point

black and white illustration of a man carrying a passed-out woman in a stately hall with curving stairs and a hookah by a column — credit: Wikimedia Commons, Gustave Le Rouge and Henri Thiriet

After this new Nosferatu, I think we can let this trope die, right? The women in our fiction deserve better than this shallow treatment, right? Also, I have my doubts that these wispy Victorian solicitors can lift ladies this way. My kid’s starting to get a little to big for this, and I lift weights. No way there’s enough protein in jellied eels and beans on toast for those guys to lift their deadweight, corset-wearing damsels like this.

Old Vampire Movies Are How I Picture Kafka Novels

screentshot from an old black-and-white movie where a woman in a houndstooth trench coat holds a small gun to the chest of a man wearing a three-piece suit — credit: Wikimedia Commons, Louis Feuillade

This looks like Gregor and his cousin who is telling him to quit complaining about being a cockroach and go to his damn job. Or Joseph K’s girlfriend telling him to stop lying because them police wouldn’t be locking him up if he hadn’t done something. “Go to the penal colony or I’ll shoot!” “You can’t, I’m an old vampire!”

Just Like Coffins, You Never Know What’s Hiding In Wikimedia Commons

what looks like a marker drawing of Nosferatu wearing a long black hooded cloak — credit: Wikimedia Commons, Spettro84

Look at this marker drawing. You can still find surprising stuff on the internet. Do you think Spettro84 knows this drawing is on Wikimedia Commons? If you’re reading this, Spettro84, I love your Nosferatu fan art.

As I’ve Said Before, I Wish I Lived In A Place With Cool Street Art

a mural painted on the side of a tunnel bridge with a teenaged-looking vampire with that swoopy haircut and red eyes reaching out at the viewer — credit: Wikimedia Commons, Bradley Michael

I mean, I do live in a place with plenty of cool street art. But nothing like this, with its Wile E. Coyote-esque use of a bricked-over tunnel as a canvas. This is Govan, and there are certain things we here in the States could learn from a place like Govan. Namely, give the horror artists government grants.

Sorry you got an email,

Chris

“A strangeness. A ripple of unease…A sense that there was a reason to watch one’s back when shadows grew long.” – Isabel Cañas, ‘Vampires of El Norte’

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