I was excited to be asked to join a new discussion group on the theme of death and different approaches to it in art practice. As I was involved in the collaborative Momento Mori project last year, and found exploring the topic so interesting, I am keen to learn more about it and to discover other people's attitudes towards it.
The discussion was enthralling. One thing that I observed was how vast and contrasting people's opinions were on the subject, although all of us include it in our work and many of us are very good friends (I find it curious that friends, who have so much in common, can differ so greatly in some ways). For example, some people said they are very concerned and troubled by the idea of being forgotten after they die, and feel they need to leave a legacy; where as, although I struggle with how so many people throughout history live and die completely anonymously while others are very well known, I am very comfortable with being forgotten. It doesn't really bother me that people in the future, who I don't know, should think of me or know me for any reason. My view is that I won't know either way so I don't value its importance. Similarly, some people held strong beliefs in a religious after life, and found the idea reassuring. Entirely to the contrary, I have no belief in souls and believe that human life is finite, and I find reassurance in its transience.
A few years ago I read a theory by palaeontologist Scott Sampson in a collection of essays titled 'What is Your Dangerous Idea?' Sampson's idea is that the purpose, or inevitable function, of all life is to disperse energy, to consume it and pass it on for the rest of time. This idea really resonated with me, it seems coherent scientifically and I like how it suggests that life is part of a continuous process. In the same way that the elemental particles of the medals' bronze have existed in different forms throughout history, there is something poetic about life being an accumulation of energies dispersed throughout the Universe. Therefore when I think of death, and what happens after we die, I think of energy: the nutrients that will pass on to other organisms if bodies are buried and decay, or the heat and light energy produced by cremation. The first idea I like because it is almost like reincarnation, but physically not spiritually. The notion of cremation is also very poetic because it literally returns the body to dust.
Having never experienced the death of someone close to me, I think I have a unique stance within the group. I can't properly empathise with attitudes of mourning and I have never felt grief over the definite loss of a person. However, the Death Café has made me consider how death is not an easily defined state and that it can manifest itself in more than the body's physical function. It was suggested that death can also be the loss of a place in time, childhood, innocence, friendship... all of which I have experienced in my life. The Summer after leaving senior school, I remember writing a diary entry about loss, and grief over school days and routines which I would never return to. This interpretation of death certainly impacts my art practice and my use of imagery; I photograph things a lot, write down ideas, log information, never throw things away to keep them alive and in my thoughts. I am starting to consider memory in my current projects, using photography and everyday materials to represent particular times and experiences. In my Blue Marble Instagram project, I am logging the colour of the outside of my house every day I leave it; the collection is both an obsessive extension of how Instagram is used, and a symbol of how memory is stimulated through photographs and dates.
Asked to write a summary of my input into the discussion, I wrote some words about the theme of death in my art practice:
I don't directly address the theme of death in my practice, but there are certainly many areas of the subject which interest me and feed into my work. I have always been drawn to the aesthetic of decay, of ageing and degeneration, where nature overrides all. I think my artwork deals with life, more than death, but with a view that everything is cyclical; growth and decay are one and the same. I am also interested in participating in these conversations because death is such a powerful subject that prompts people to discuss their deeply held emotions, and beliefs about the nature of the world. My pursuit of art is perhaps also a pursuit of this sincerity and open inquisitiveness about life. There are few platforms in society where talking openly about death and philosophy is encouraged besides art (and now, Falmouth Death Café!)
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