Candelabras, jack o' lanterns and by the way I like horror movies

I'm watching giant dragonflies, and tiny lizards, all over the patio garden. The dragonflies are so large they seem almost prehistoric. The lizards, well, aren't quite as big as they used to be in the same era. I think the lemon tree is almost ready to start ripening, but I really have no idea when that is supposed to happen...I'm just thrilled at the idea that they are growing outside. So that is how I try to wrap my head around autumn, after a week in which it was in the 90s for a couple of days, and I lost my spooky momentum. This is the time of year that I should be watching candelabra movies (see my recent posts on Tumblr for a slew of those)... Typically, Jean Rollin & co., Mario Bava, the usual 1960s and 70s European horror suspects. Now...now it's finally feeling like candelabra weather.

 What I REALLY want to do right now is watch Dark Shadows, but all of my DVDs are in NJ and I can't remember where I left off. I think in the early 500s (volume 8 or 9 of the old DVD boxes). Adam was lurching around...I think Cassandra was in some serious trouble. At any rate, speaking of candelabras....this isn't from the series, it's from one of the movies, Night of Dark Shadows (1971) but WE SHALL NOT SPEAK of any later incarnations of the series, as I only live in the 1960s and 1970s, and very occasionally the early 80s.

Speaking of which, my tastes have gone a little bit more into the modern era recently. I've been feeling in the mood to watch early 80s slasher films. Basically, anything in which lots of teenagers don't fare very well. Nothing against teenagers, per se, it's just good fodder for a movie. The look and feel of 1980s things has acquired more of a vintage sheen now that the world in many ways no longer resembles it. When you watch something wherein everyone talks on land-bound phones; the hair and clothing are distinctly of another era; the music is synthesizer-based in a very specific way that you don't hear any more; and the clichés are being cheerfully driven into the ground....there is a certain charm in that. Even moreso in the Shot On Video VHS tape films like those I've been lucky enough to see at the Alamo Drafthouse recently ("The Abomination," et. al.). But more on that later perhaps.

I'm actually not here to talk about candelabras or horror films at all, I'm here to talk about jack o' lanterns. I have quite a few of them in the ol' Etsy shop and I try to use this blog to show off all that art stuff, so let's get on with it. Here is my most recent little Halloween painting.

It was done to be a part of a month-long Halloween jack o' lantern promo over here...

For an ever-growing assortment of jack o' lantern themed Halloween art and crafts for sale this month, check the link above...and visit the Halloween shop on the site as well. I have five originals and 15 prints for sale on that site, with postage included in all prices in the US...but there is lots of stuff by other artists as well!

There's lots of stuff newly available in the Halloween Artist Bazaar shop with the postage included in price, including 5 x 7 photo prints of one of my most popular paintings, "Dark Lanterns"... also available in my Etsy shop along with the original from which the prints were taken. The first time I did a version of this painting was around 2001, and I have had several custom commissions for it as well. I always take commissions for repaints in any size, or variations on previous paintings I've done...or completely new works that are within the scope of my themes.

"Guardian of Pumpkin Woods" available as a 5 x 7 photo print at the link above, and also at Etsy.

"Black Lantern Spell" available above postage paid, or at Etsy.

One more for now, "Alice in the Dark Woods" prints can be found above postage paid, and also at Etsy with variable shipping options as an original or a print.

Meanwhile, though it's only barely feeling like the end of summer now, we did get a bit of atmosphere in recently at the giant bug display at the Houston Zoo...needless to say my favorite critter was the tarantula. I miss having these little guys around!

More soon on other things of a creepy nature.