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The Vampire Twins

Date1977

Illustration CitationCover for "The Vampire Twins; Dracula's Children Alive!" in Eerie Magazine, June 1978

MediumAcrylic-gesso and oil on Masonite™

Dimensions23 3/8 x 17 1/4 in. (59.4 x 43.8 cm)
frame: 29 3/4 x 23 1/2 in. (75.6 x 59.7 cm)

Credit LineGift of Don Maitz, 1991. © Don Maitz

Object number1991-102

On View

Not on view

Label TextDon Maitz painted The Vampire Twins as a cover for Eerie, an American magazine of horror comics published from 1966 to 1983. The assigned theme for the issue was vampires. According to the artist, he designed the graveyard gate to suggest a skull with a cranium, two eye sockets, and vertical bars for teeth. The models for the identical vampires carrying off their victim in the rising mist were the artist's cousin (who switched positions for each twin) and his girlfriend.

"This is the first time I incorporated my signature into rather onto a painting," the artist said. "By placing my name as carved into a tombstone, I literally put myself into my work. Howard Pyle urged upon his students to identify with one’s art, and I hope he would have approved of my decision."