Hekatos Mist Art

Total Drawing Time: approx one hour and twenty minutes

I love a good forest. Forests are often though of as liminal spaces—somewhere to be travelled through, not dwelled in. A place between places. I always loved C.S. Lewis's concept of the Wood Between Worlds. In the Magician's Nephew, the chronological first of the Narnia books, this is a place that Diggory and Polly visit; it's full of calm pools that are really portals to their world and many others.

I think this forest might be a similar place, somewhere Teddy passes through with Seir. Somewhere not-quite-right, far quieter than a winter wood ought to be. No birdsong, no life. Just the trees and the snow, and a boy and his demon.

I love the idea of Seir talking in a very specific way—he doesn't use abstract metaphors, he never says things sarcastically or ironically, if what he says is strange it's because it's meant to be.

Additionally, he (or they, or she, or xe... demon gender is nebulous at best) is a contract demon so any request Teddy makes of him has to be framed in the context of the contract (i.e. "would you pls stop floating all the small items on my desk so I can focus on studying, which will help my thesis")

I also love the idea of Seir showing Teddy all sorts of extradimensional stuff and taking him to other planes of existence and shit because, well, if his thesis is on theology then he ought to know about this sort of thing, right?

I've had these two for a few hours and I'm already very attached lol

For me the idea of the monstrous is linked to the Other, the taboo, the deviant and the disenfranchised. Those who are separate from the status quo are characterized as Monstrous, and monsters are coded as part of these groups. We on the fringes of society find ourselves in the villains of stories, and reclaim them for ourselves. Monsters are queer and monsters are fun and monsters makes their own rules and protect their own when those in power won't.

Who is the monster and who is the bad guy, and are they the same? There's a reason why Eliza kisses the fish man in Shape of Water. He's a monster, yes, but he's not the bad guy. (If you want to learn more about this I highly recommend the video "My Monster Boyfriend" by Lindsay Ellis)

This is a lino cut I made in December as part of the printmaking module at school. I was inspired by the trope of the Lesbian Vampire, as well as religious imagery. In early films following the introduction of the Hays code, the only way of including queer elements was in villainous or tragic characters. Dracula's Daughter (1936) began the long running movie tradition of the predatory lesbian vampire. This influences to this day both the horror genre and society's perception of queer women. I think the whole thing is fascinating.

"All monstrousity is queer." - Anne Malamet, Why Are People Into That: Vampires.