fall -

by Public Service Associate Juliana

//image still from official trailer, *A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night*

I was never a vampire reader, no Dracula, The Queen of the Damned, or Salem’s Lot. My preferred medium for vampire lore has always been film. With that said, I have always been drawn to movies based on books. Interview with the Vampire based on the Anne Rice novel and Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust based on the novels written by Hideyuki Kikuchi, are two of my favorites. I recall staying home sick from school in the early 2000s watching Vampire Hunter D for the umpteenth time. I paused on a favorite scene and decided to draw the still, copying exactly what I saw on the screen. When I wrote about the experience in the journal I had to keep for art class, my teacher commented that I had “experienced the healing power of art.” I’ve returned to this thought many times throughout my life, the idea that art can heal. And now with that connective tissue, I forever equate vampire movies as a kind of magic medicine.