Dracula (Bela Lugosi)

After drawing Hannibal Lector the day before, I had an idea of focusing my Inktober pieces on classic horror movie monsters and villains, and what better monster to start off with than Dracula?

While the Francis Ford Coppola film is my favourite adaption, I chose to draw the Bela Lugosi version because the natural black and white of the reference photos, due to the movie being filmed in the 1930’s. My focus for this piece was to really capture the hard contrast of black and white of the photo, especially the light that highlighted Bela Lugosi’s eyes so distinctly. I wanted to capture the likeness of his eyes too, since they were so accentuated and are the main focus of the piece. Looking back at it now, I could’ve worked in a bit more dark shadows on the shaded parts of his face to make the light of his eyes really pop and bring a bit more dimension overall to his portrait. I think I should’ve also used the liquid India ink for his cloak just to add texture, since the contrast between Bela’s face and the permanent marker cloak do have a noticeable disconnect. Nonetheless, I’m very proud of this piece and it’s one of my favourites of last year’s Inktober.

The Universal Monsters have always been my favourites and they always remind me of Halloween in elementary school.

Growing up, Halloween was never a major “holiday” for me and my family, and so my only exposure to anything remotely ghoulish was in elementary school.

(Having grown up now, I realize that it’s probably not the best doctrine to promote to children, especially with it being called “Devil’s Night”, but I digress.)

Nonetheless, as a child, you don’t grasp or understand the devilish powers of indoctrination and all you can think about is dressing up and loading your pillowcase to the brim with candies that your parents will “hold onto” for safe keeping. Only realizing that they’ve eaten half your bag in secret and are doling out scraps to keep you satisfied. It was this time in October though that I always had the most fun. The weather was now beginning its turn towards winter and the smell of dead leaves and oncoming winter air swirled together to make an unforgettable scent that I still look forward to every year. The leaves that are still on the trees had ripened to their most beautiful colors, while the ones that could hold on no longer lazily fell to the ground below. The sun no longer blazes as hot as it did during the summer (metaphorically speaking) but its rays are still strong enough to shield us a bit longer from old man winter. And as the world died around us, we kids were too busy focused first on Thanksgiving (I’m Canadian so we have it in October) and secondly on Halloween.

Being exposed “innocently” to the creatures of the night definitely left an impression on me to this day. They’re grandiose, larger than life legends that have impacted every facet of pop culture, and yet are also perfect examples of true horror. They are creatures that challenge our reality, that bring meaning to Lovecraft’s quote, “The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.” While their horror significance may have all but dwindled due to vampire and werewolf love triangles, depressed teenage girls and more recently bad Netflix adaptions (Netflix’s Dracula was just awful) these creatures with all their lore and mysticism attached to them have endured through time for a reason. They are horrors not because of a cheap jump scare, but because they fill you with dread and hopelessness. Because you’ve encountered something so otherworldly, so demonic that there is no rational explanation on how monstrosities like Dracula, the Wolfman, the Creature from the Black Lagoon, Frankenstein, Mr. Hyde etc. could exist in our physical world without a proper explanation.

But that’s the true horror of it, isn’t it? Not knowing? The speculation that something similar or the monsters themselves inhabit some dark, undiscovered place in our world? It’s fun to think about, at least for me. While obviously there are many more realistic fears to be had, these monsters represent the biggest and oldest one that all humans share. The fear of the unknown. Whether it’s not knowing if you’ll make it to work or home safely. Whether or not you won’t wake up every time you go to sleep. Whether or not you’ll get that job you want, or your crush will respond positively to your advances. Whether or not you get mugged in the street or you get into a car crash doing a small errand. Either way, the amount of unknown moments are incalculable. We don’t know what will happen 1 minute to the next, and yet we live our lives as if living until we’re old is promised and preordained. I’m beyond guilty of this. With the sheer amount of time I’ve wasted in my life, I feel like I could’ve definitely saved myself a few years. It’s been a few months since I last did a ‘Reflections in Ink’ entry and I’ve definitely felt the guilt mount up as I’ve wasted time and tried to make sure I knew what happened on a minute to minute basis. This way of life ultimately leads to emptiness while the burning desire to chase your dream festers and poisons your mind so that any reminders of your dream becomes resentment towards yourself, and this is no way to live.

Ultimately, we shouldn’t fear the unknown. The way a cross and a wooden stake put an end to the iconic creature of the night, so does chasing a fulfilling life put an end to the quiet desperation inside yourself. (That and a bit of Christian divinity but that’s another essay for another time.)

Yes, not knowing is scary but choosing to give up and let Dracula take your wife and ravage your city is a much worse fate than not even trying. I’m still learning that every day of my life as I stumble and improvise through life, but it doesn’t mean you stop. You pick yourself up, grab your best wooden stake and silver crucifix and you charge straight forward into the unknown.