Its End is Breath Taking by Cyen

God pours life into death and detah into life without a drop being spilled.

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Unknown

All say, “How har its is that we have to die” A strange complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.

— Mark Twain

No one can confidently say that he will still be living tomorrow

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Euripides

To himself everyone is immortal; he may know that he is going to die, but he can never know that he is dead.

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Sam Butler

The day which we fear as our last is but the birday of eternity.

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Seneca

Death is a delightful hiding place for weary men.

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Herodotus

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before.

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Edgar Allan Poe

This publication accompanies the hypothetical exhibition It’s End is Breathtaking at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, on view from April 23 through August 9, 2016. This project was conceived and designed in the Typography 4: Print Editorial class at the Art Center College of Design. Authors: France Lorin, Sylvère Lotringer Catalog design & edited by: Sam Yen Instructor: Stephen Serrato Printer: Indie Printing Typefaces: ITC Franklin Gothic, Foundry Gridnik Paper: Mohawk uncoated, Sugar Cane © 2016 by Art Center College of Design, 1700 Lida Street, Pasadena, CA 91103 All rights reserved. All images are © the artists, reproduced with the kind permission of the artists and/or their representatives. Every effort has been made to contact copyright holders and to ensure that all the information presented is correct. Some of the facts in this volume may be subject to debate or dispute. If proper copyright acknowledgment has not been made, or for clarifications and corrections, please contact the publishers and we will correct the information in future reprintings, if any. ISBN 978-0-9802055-1-0

ITS END IS BREATH TAKING

ITS END IS BREATH TAKING Curated by Sam Yen, Los Angeles County Museum of Art

An exhibition about the confrontation of the uncomfortable

p. 80 — 93

p. 64 — 77

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p. 40 — 47

p. 24 — 39

p. 22 — 23

Damien hirst

polly morgan

jan weenix

2nd essay

MAIN ESSAY

INTRO

p. 159

p. 156 — 158

p. 144 — 153

p. 128 — 141

p. 112 — 125

p. 96 — 109

It’s end is breathtaking

Bibliography

ExhibitionS & Works

interviewS

emma kisiel

henry hargreaves

Jeff. silverthorne

It’s end is breathtaking Over seventy million people die each year, with

scend death by finding meaning for their lives; they

death appearing in various guises and in different

establish spiritual dimensions apart from bodily

proportions — from the casualties of international

reality — religion — and creates those “culturally

wars and the victims of neighborhood violence to

standardized hero systems and symbols” which we

friends and family members who die from old age

call art. Artists tend to make work that addresses,

and illness. More than 100,000 Iraqis died in the

directly and indirectly, big issues, and death is cer-

recent Gulf conflict, and current statistics say that

tainly among the biggest of them. The Los Angeles

black men substantially less chance of making it

County Museum of Art has chosen open its season

through their twenties than men in other racial

with a thematic exhibition which opens out onto the

groups. In the eighties, most noticeable, AIDS has

politics and poetry surrounding issues of mortality.

brought death home to hundreds of thousands of

The artists in this exhibition have chosen to make

people whose loved ones have died prematurely.

work that confronts death, not necessarily in order

And yet in Western culture most people are condi-

to transcend it but in order to investigate life itself.

tioned to deny death’s existence by banishing it to

This confrontation with death, so deeply feared in

spaces outside our everyday frame of reference. We

culture that values youth, good health, and material

cannot seem to see death as anything other than

gains above all else, can lead to an acute sensiti-

catastrophic, abnormal, terrifying, and foreign. We

zation to and participation in our daily lives. In this

refuse it, identifying it as evil, because we cannot

sense, the exhibition is an act of affirmation. It is

control it. But death is as natural as life, and it is

our hope that visitor will also find themselves affir-

inevitable. Ernest Becker, in his book The Denial of

matively engaged with the communality suggested by

Death (1973), postulates that human beings tran-

these images and ideas.

POLLY MORGAN

INTRODUCTION

24 Fig. 1

Jeffrey Silverthorne, “Listen . . . The Woman Who Died in Her Sleep,” 1972 — 74, Black-and-white photograph, 16 x 20”. Photo courtesy of the artist.

It’s end is breathtaking

France Morin

“To obtain some sort of access to . . . sensibilities

MAIN ESSAY

DEATH MAKES US ALL EQUAL cry, a silent scream, a hollow breath, a rattling, a

for comprehension and condolence, more than two

convulsions, a beating of the breasts, a pale smile,

thousand years of European cultural activity has

special clothing, special gestures, a coffin, a brave

produced a huge pictorial record of death, and

face, the kith and kin, an armorial blason, a funeral,

those painters and sculptors and printmakers and

a wreath, a wake, a photographic representation of

draughtsmen who have pursued the investigation,

the corpse?”

have done so using what we are, after all, technical processes to find technical solutions. How is death depicted? How do you “picture” deat? Through what

— Peter Greenaway, Death in the Seine

pictorial imagery has death been made most manifest? How do you significantly depict the moment of dying? How do you pictorially differentiate death

To Obtain Some Sort of Access

do you depict the pain and despair and relief of the

The question Peter Greenaway so eloquently poses

dying? Do you show death by its after-effects? What

in Death in the Seine are the questions I asked

do you observe and invent and paint to in order to

myself as I first began thinking about this exhibi-

pass along the experience? Pallor, rigidity, fear,

tion. Death touches all of our lives. Yet the subject

rigor mortis, worms, bones, a small winged spirit

of death, what we might call the long hard look at

descending, tears, a seizure, a signed will, a black

death, is one that has become “forbidden zone”; our

cross, a black edge, a black frame, a grimace, a

private worlds of griefs and mourning have been

from sleep? How do you show death arriving? How

given little space.1 Death is a personal event in

understanding of death? Can art help us through

one’s life. But it is also a social and political

the painful experience of death? How can we use

arena of struggle in which differing definitions of

works of art to obtain some sort of access? The

the meaning and value of life (and lives) are con-

answer lies, in part, I believe, in the viewer’s

tested, as attested to by our current debates on

personal experience with death and one’s own

abortion, euthanasia, the death penalty, and a host

cultural tradition.

of other issues, Consequently, through the emerThe Authority of Proximity

The phrase “forbidden zone” comes from Michael Lesy’s The Forbidden Zone

biological fact is also being questioned. With the

When all’s said and done, we take photographs of

onset of the AIDS epidemic in the 80’s — by the end

the dead, and we look closely at them because of

of the decade more than 300,000 people had died of

their authority. We simply want to see what death

Rick Smolan, Phillip Moffitt, and Mathew Naythons, M.D., The Power to Heal; Ancient Arts and Modern Medicine(New York: Prentice Hall Press, 1990), p. 163.

diseases associated with the AIDS virus2 — and the

looks like. We do so in hope that closeness may

inadequacy and irresponsibility of government and

attenuate horror, that knowing may come through

mass media response, death has become a major

seeing, and that from the authority of proximity may

Franz Kafka as quoted in Roland Barthes’ Camera Lucida (New York: Hill and Wang, 1981), p. 53.

and visible concern of many activists and artists.

come understanding, even, eventually, acceptance.

gence of bioethics and technological developments, like cryonics and genetic engineering, death as a

For the this exhibition, I could not, of course, cover

— Jo. C. Tartt, Jr., Taken: Photography and Death.

the entire spectrum of issues and concerns related to the breadth and depth of the theme. It was my

Kafka wrote that “we photograph things in order to

aim, instead, to bring together works that demon-

drive them out of our minds.”3 Photography is some-

strate how the significance of death is translated

thing like embalming, an attempt to stop time. Is it

into a variety of contemporary artistic and cultural

primarily by trying to stop time, by trying to capture

practices, through non-traditional visual represen-

it and pin it down, that we best evoke the powerful

tations. Many of these works seek to challenge both

feelings associated with death? Several artists in

the biased representations of death fed to us by the

It’s End is Breathtaking bring death into light with

mass media and the rampant fear of death that

photography. They choose photography, perhaps

permeates all aspects of our culture. In organizing

as the cultural critic Benjamin Buchloh suggests,

this exhibition, I was also interested in a larger

because of “the inability of painting to represent

question concerning the role and pertinence of

contemporary history resulted·from the transfor-

works of art in addressing the private and public

mation of historical experience into an experience

spheres of death. Can a work of art serve as an

of collective catastrophe. It therefore seemed that

adequate mediator? How does it increase our

only photography, In its putative access to facility

historical representation.” The artists who use this

tion of death and the simulacra of disappearance

medium question both photography as “death” —

in modern rituals of death, we are never given the

Benjamin Buchloh, “A Note on Gerhard Richter’s October 18, 1977,” October no. 48, (Spring 1989), p. 97. 5. See John Berger’s About Looking (New York: Pantheon Books, 1980), pp. 39 — 40.

chance to look at death, to really familiarize ourselves with it. However, if we can let the works of

sentation of death by addressing its different facets:

It’s End is Breath Taking reveal their personal and

the vulnerability of the body and the limits of med-

collective histories and memories, perhaps we can

icine; identity and identification; collective memory

begin to accept death as a part of life, and do more

and history; natural, accidental and artificial deaths;

than only hear of it, like a distant voice in various

death as a metaphor through the anonymous gaze;

language: the language of truth and science, the

death as sleep. In the work of these artists, there

language of economy, the language of religion and

is a double negation in that death is represented

immortality. Perhaps we will be able to take a “long

through photography and the photographic process

hard look” at death.

itself is used as a kind of death. Photographs of death are often difficult and contradictory for the

June 18

viewer, however. Photographs of war, for instance, often show moments of agony in order to elicit our

Why is someone’s death always some kind

concern, but a viewer may be so unnerved by such

of scandal?

an image as to lose the ability to feel and react. The response to the photograph is, then, often expe-

— Vladimir Jankelevitch, La Mort

rienced as a “personal moral inadequacy”; and so through the sublimation of morality, feelings of shock

All these moments will be lost in time like tears in

give away to feelings of guilt and insufficiency.5 The

the rain.

fact of death becomes secondary to a rationalized response. Perhaps we cannot look at images of

— David Wojnarowicz,

death because we cannot look at death itself. We do not believe in the power of images of death because

When I put my hands on your body. With the sudden

death has lost all its authority in our culture even

death of my older sister three years ago, my per-

if it is everywhere, present at each moment of our

sonal confrontation with death joined the tapestry of

lives. I believe we can transform this uneasiness

so many other losses in our contemporary culture.

and take a look, on that will hopefully free us from a

Lise was 43. I saw her die. The concept of death

socially codified and sanitized experience of death,

and the experience of death are very different. I

and enable us to relate personally to the private

watched the cold entering her body slowly, her last 27

the photographic still renders inanimate a single moment in the continuum of time — and the repre-

It’s end is breathtaking

world of mourning and grief. With the medicaliza-

MAIN ESSAY

and objectivity, could qualify as an instrument of

breath. Ten days after Lise’s arrival in the hospital,

a soul, at that very moment fills the room to the rit-

the doctors, considering her condition, had given

ual of the dead in our culture. June 18. The next day

her three weeks to live. I flew home shortly after

was Father’s Day.

that. I knew the doctor’s’ verdict was right. From that moment, each gesture, each word, each look

The Process of Disappearance

into her eyes became almost intolerable. Did she

and Simulacra

know? She never talked about it, nor did we, her family. Her determination in eating her last meal that

Procedures are so fragmented that no single per-

Friday night, the night before she died — did she

son remains responsible. All actions are mediated

know that it would be her last meal, that she would

by others or shared with others. Everything is done

fight for her life the whole night long, never sleeping,

by administrative decree and court order, conveyed

sitting up abruptly in her bed every time the urge

from person to person, down a chain of command

to sleep became too strong; up, down, up, down, for

and obedience . . . Murderers die, but no one man

eight, ten hours, until the early morning of what was

ever kills them.

to be her last day? Then she became peaceful, quiet, resigned. Her whole demeanor changed. Ordinarily

— Michael Levy, The Forbidden Zone

a reserved person, she now sought our comfort and affection. We gave it to her, in total disbelief, as

The reality of death has never been so removed from

if in some kind of trance of duty and pure denial. I

our daily lives. Though the spectacle of violent death

cannot forget the small chapel we visited next door

comes rushing at us from the mass media — mur-

when we had to leave the room, when the fear, pain,

ders, famine, earthquakes, war, plane crashes —

and confusion became too intense. Was life about

the parade of images has simultaneously served to

nothingness? Elisabeth Kubler-Ross has said that

distance us from the reality. Yet, how do we decide

you have to have a sense of history to die in peace.

what images are acceptable when dealing with

How is that possible when you are so young? We

death? Whether they be images of radioactive clouds

are all gathered around her bed, holding her. It is

and rain when, on August 6, 1945, the first atomic

around 8 p.m. My mother talks to her with a courage

bomb was dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki,

I believe must only be given to a mother when she

killing 80,000 people in the blast 60,000 more

has to assist her child, at whatever age, into death.

within a year; images of napalm raining down in

That moment, that second that separates someone

Vietnam War from 1961 to 1973; the mass graves

alive and someone dead will obsess you for the rest

of the Holocaust and World War II that killed more

of your life. This is true for me. It is Saturday night.

than 45 million, including 6 million Jews. Television

The body becomes this empty shell and a presence,

is now taken as a proof of such events. For

It’s end is breathtaking MAIN ESSAY Hans Daunser, Medizin I, 1984, Series of 11 black-and-white photographs, 20 × 24” each, Photo courtesy of the Curt Marcus Gallery, New York

Fig. 2

example, Ceausescu’s corpse was shown as a proof

in the funeral home. The body is processed with

of his death. The recent Gulf war was staged on

techniques that funeral personnel are hesitant to

CNN during prime time with a massive display of

discuss. “The point is to keep, in death, the look of

fireworks, and after 42 days, an absence of dead

life, the natural look; he still smiles at us, the same

bodies. Fear, violence, blood, pain, and death do

color, the same skin, he looks like himself, beyond

not exist. The physical and emotional violence of

death, he is even somewhat fresher than when he

the long years of Vietnam have to be erased by this

was alive, he only lacks his ability to speak.”6 This, of

electronic, high-tech war. The spectacularization of

course, is the luxury of a certain amount of money.

Jean Baudrillard as quoted in Louis-Vincent Thomas, Mort et Pouvoir (Paris: Payot, 1978), p. 124.

Jean Baudrillard, L’echange symbolique et la mort (Paris: Editions Gallimard, 1976), p. 224.

death, the glamorization of death accompanied by its standard narrative soundbites, does not concern

Rituals have always existed in every culture, and

us. It is the death of “others,” not my death. Televi-

they have major role in grief and mourning, but our

sion reassures us that all these atrocities happens

obsession today with denying death at any cost and

to others. The proximity of television screen brings

creating the illusion of the “real” with our mod-

death close to us in vivid colors, while at the same

ern rituals of the dead only emphasizes our fear of

time it distances us from death, a remote event

death, of cadavers, and of decay. The reality and

that happens to strangers. Watching death on the

acceptance of natural, biological death has even

news, we consume it. Death becomes a commod-

become more clouded now that the definition of

ity, and loses its content to the logic of advertis-

death is in question. Think, in contrast, of the bodies

ing. When we see advertising for the car, we do

abandoned to the “rituals” of the potter’s field or

not see the accident; when we see the American

left in the cold drawers of the morgue. The anxiety

Express ads for our future travel, it is minus the

and panic generated by fears of death sustain a

plane crash. The language of death in the media and

culture that revolves around consumption. “I shop

its “spectacularization” are part of the economy.

therefore, I am,” declares an artwork by Barbara

Similarly, when our loved ones appear to us again

Kruger – I shop therefore, I am not dead . . . yet.

after death, in funeral homes, who or what are we

The inevitability of death used as an inducement to

really seeing? The ritualization of death reflects a

buy, buy, buy: In the capitalist system, each person

persistent attempt to transcend the horror death

is alone before the great equalizer. The same way,

inspires. All the procedures that the corpse under-

each person finds herself/ himself alone in the

goes — from embalming to cremation to mummify-

face of death — and this is not a coincidence. For

ing — before it reaches its final resting place, help

the great equalizer is death. It is, from that point

to insure that this is indeed the end of the journey

on, the obsession with death and the will to abolish

for the body, and forbid it from coming back. Now-

death by accumulation that becomes the fundamen-

adays, the corpse disappears only to reappear,

tal driving rationale of the political economy . . . .

sterilized, cleaned, properly prepared for viewing,

The accumulation of time imposes the idea of prog-

very soon a mixture of water, pink Pepto-Bismol,

idea of truth. The industry of death in itself opens

and blood was spurting out of the tube in the old

even more avenues for production and consump-

lady’s neck, and running down the table to a drain

tion: coffins, crematorial urns, embalming services,

between her feet. “We’ll give her a while, then we’ll

musical accompaniment, tombstones, cosmetic work

aspirate her”. . . . By the time he’d washed, rinsed,

on the dead . . . .

and dried, her, the reservoir of the embalming

It’s end is breathtaking

ress, as the accumulation of science imposes the

Michael Lesy, The Forbidden Zone, pp. 243 — 246

“That’s it,” He said.

to the counter and picked up a polished metal tube. It was about two and a half feet long, and it had a

Raymond rolled up his sleeves, slipped on an apron,

sharp, hollow point at one end, rounded on the top,

pulled on a pair of latex surgical gloves, and took

flat on the bottom, with three little holes like snouts

two bottle of fluid off the shelf of the kitchen

drilled into the underside of its tip. At the other end

cabinet . . . It smelled like cherry cough syrup and

were two fittings for hoses. He held it up in front

looked like Pepto-Bismol. “That’s the embalm-

of me. It looked like a lance. “This is what you call

ing fluid . . . . Mix a bottle of this with a bottle of

a troca or an aspirator; it doesn’t matter, it does

cavity fluid . . . add two and a half gallons of water,

the samething.” He connected one of the trocar’s

that’ll do her.” He poured the bottles into the glass

fittings to the hose he’d used to run fluid into the

reservoir of the machine, added water from a hose

old lady. He connected another to her belly, just

connected to the same plumbing fixture as the toilet,

below her rib cage, to the right of the midline . . . .

and then turned back to the old lady . . . . He cut

The sound of the machine changed from a hum to a

open a V-shaped flap of skin on the left side of her

rapid, steady thump-thump-thump, and the con-

neck close to the collarbone . . . . “The carotid’s

tents of the old lady’s intestines began to pump out

the way in; the jugular’s the way out.” He took an

of her, into the toilet. Raymond twisted and turned

L-shaped probe, slipped it under both blood ves-

the trocar, pumping it up and down like a ram-

sels, and tugged them out . . . . He . . . held up a

rod, rotating it, now in one direction, now in the

long, stainless steel tube with a thin metal rod in

other, puncturing the walls of her organs. “Sucks

it. “This is your drain tube.” He snipped open the

it all up,” he said. “Otherwise she’d bloat and push

jugular and slid the tube down it. Then he pumped

everything up, out of her mouth and nose. You don’t

the metal rod up and down like a plunger . . . . Then

want this, you get yourself a real mess”. . . . Then

you have to open up the other side and put your

he drew out the trocar, wiped it with a paper towel,

fluid in there . . . . He left the drain tube in the

and screwed a gray plastic plug into the hole he’d

jugular, slipped an L-shaped metal catheter into

made. “That’s it,” he said.8

the carotid, connected the catheter to a hose, and turned on the pump . . . . The machine hummed, and

MAIN ESSAY

machine was almost empty . . . . He reached over

32 Fig. 3

Jeffrey Silverthorne, “Listen . . . The Woman Who Died in Her Sleep,” 1972 — 74, Black-and-white photograph, 16 × 20”. Photo courtesy of the artist.

MAIN ESSAY

Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s end is breathtaking

What Remains of Death

the individual approaching death? his or her family or friends? physicians? medical administrators?

Nowadays, there is more struggle to resist death than there was before to gain eternal life.

the clergy? the new class of professionals we call bioethicists? There are more questions. There is, for example, the burgeoning industry of “body parts”:

— Louis-Vincent Thomas, Mort et Pouvoir

The body is rapidly becoming the raw material for the inchoate industry of biotechnology, which stands to earn millions of dollars from products

“That’s it, “ he said. Or is it? As we approach the

derived from a freak spleen cell or an efficacious

end of the 20th Century, it is far easier to deter-

gene . . . . Do we own our bodies, to do with them

mine when embalming eds than when — and how

as we like, including selling them off?10 Are our

— life ends. Obsessed with youth, our culture is

bodies becoming the field of technological experi-

also obsessed with technologies to postpone death,

ments, are we contributing to the commodification

often at any cost. Stay young and pharmaceutical

of the body with organ transplants and new defini-

products, medical and “lifestyle” strategies for life

tions of death? The other side of this coin is the new

extension together constitute a major industry in

science of non-death, mapping the causes of aging

our society: the industry against death. Tradition-

and death? The other side of this coin is the new

ally, death was defined based on an “irreversible

molecular technology; miniature biosensors; futur-

respiratory and cardiac cessation.” Now, in our

istic nanomachines (themselves hardly larger than

time, there are machines that push oxygen in and

red blood cells); gene replacement therapy; protein

pull carbon dioxide out of the lungs, that rhythmi-

engineering. The list can go on and on. There is

cally shock the heart into a physiologically normal

also an array of new choices to be made, options

beat, that keep the blood warm and flowing through

for dealing with the body after death, or at the

the tissues of the body, and the skin pink and

suggested onset of death. The DNA molecule, the

resilient. These machines can preserve the body in

elementary building-block for all life, contains within

a life-like state even if human consciousness and

itself the blueprints for infinite self-replication, and

sensibility are forever to an irreversible coma.9

thereby the possibility for its own immortality. And

Recent court cases attest to the fact that techno-

it is immortality that the people who have signed

logical advances in artificially prolonging life are

up for cryonic suspension hope for. Cryonics is

considered by many as an invasive tampering with

the process of freezing dead bodies in hopes that

the quality of life. New and painful questions arise

science will bring them back to life in the future;

about the very definitions of life and death. And who

the “patients” (referred to as such by the institutes

has the authority or right to make these decision:

that have frozen them, since they do not consider

Margaret Clark, “The Body as Commodity: Ritual Dismemberment in Contemporary Biomedicine,” paper given at the American Anthropological Association’s annual meeting, Nov. 15 — 19, 1989.

10. Jack Hitt, “Sacred or for Sale?,” Harper’s Magazine (October, 1990), p. 47.

through is imperative, especially in nanotechnology

dead, their bodies are put in cryonic suspension in

and genetic engineering. Many of these “patients”

liquid nitrogen, at the temperature of -320 degrees

have invested so much faith and belief in these new

Fahrenheit. Those that have faith in the possibil-

developments that they have opted for neuro (head)

ities of cryonic believe that it is not far from the

suspension, rather than that of the entire body,

embalming notions of the Egyptians. However, one

believing that when they are reanimated they will

could argue that for the Egyptians, mummification

have the option of a new and improved young body,

had more to do with the respect and the ritual of

cloned through the process of genetic engineering.

the dead, whereas cryonic suspension may have

For those that have selected the full suspension,

more to do with the denial of death. In describing

molecular technology and nanotechnology are the

cryonics, Dr. Hans P. Moravec, a research scientist

sciences they claim would repair the brain damage

working in the robotics and computer science field,

caused by freezing. If the idea of repair of biolog-

considers possible techniques for restoring and

ical materials, molecular engineering, cryonics, or

reanimating the body, thus revealing a recent shift

sophisticated organ transplants offers an array of

in attitude toward the issue of death. He writes:

possibilities for some, for other basic quality health

Cryonic suspension is the preservation . . . of a

care is economically beyond their means. 37 million

deceased person in the expectation that the future

patients in the United States alone have no health

scientific advances will eventually allow the repair

insurance. For most, the future of science and

of the condition . . . and thus permit the person to

technology and the chance to test the limits of life

be restored to life. The speculative scientific liter-

and death are still part of the folklore of science

ature contains a number of suggestions for how

fiction. A kidney transplant costs about $50,000 and

this repair might be affected. These include exten-

a heart/lung replacement, $200,000 or more, ,aking

sions of conventional medicine and microsurgery,

these procedures beyond the means of many people.

enhancements of existing human cell repair mech-

Those without health insurance may be confronted

anisms, the cloning of new body parts from single

with “choices”n such as harvesting organs, or

cells, introduction of micro-organisms genetically

selling body parts for money. Also, age and social

engineered to do microscopic repairs at the cell

status have a lot to do with the quality care that one

level, the use of ultra-miniature robots in a similar

receives: “ The alcoholic, the drug addict, the pros-

fashion, and methods for reading out the essential

titute, the drunkard, receives a diagnosis of ‘dead

contents of a brain into a working computer model,

on arrival’ upon entering the hospital. The probabil-

creating, in effect, an artificial brain, analogous to

ity for someone to be considered as dying or dead

an artificial heart.11 For those going into cryonic

depends, in part, on one’s place in the social

It’s end is breathtaking

onset of death, after having been declared medically

MAIN ESSAY

11. Hans P. Moravec, Ph. D., Research Scientist at Carnegie-Mellon University as quote in “What Scientists Say About Cryonic Suspension, “ a brochure printed by ALCOR Life Extension Foundation, a group that advocates and practices cryonic suspension.

suspension, the hope of future technological break-

them dead) hope to be reanimated one day. At the

structure.”12 Communication and cultural differ-

desire and passion and the ultimate instant of life/

ences are a major problem in health care for a vast

death. Freud questioned whether Eros, the sex-

sector of the population: of the medical doctors in

ual impulse, is not just another step on the way

the United States, only 5% are Hispanic-American

to Thanatos, the self-destructive of death: “Both

and only 3% are African-American.13

impulses,” he writes in The Ego and the Id, “the sexual impulse and the death impulse, behave like

La Petite Mort

forces of conservation in the narrowest meaning of the term, since they both tend to revert to a state

To speak of death makes us laugh a constrained and

of being that has been disturbed by the appearance

obscene laughter. To speak of sex doesn’t produce

of life.”14 For Bataille, even more than for Freud, the

the same reaction: sex is legal, only death is por-

taste for death, like the sexual drive, is an impulse

nographic. Society, “liberating” sexuality, gradually

towards a limitless state of being, outside of life.

replaces it with death through the function of a

For most people in our culture, death is understood

secret ritual and a fundamental prohibition. In an

as the “end,” the essence of discontinuity. Bataille,

anterior religious phase, death is revealed, recog-

in contrast, links death with erpticism through the

nized, and it is sexuality that is forbidden. Today it

desire for a continuity beyond the self. He writes:

is the opposite.

Between one being and another, there is a gulf, a discontinuity . . . . If you die, it is not my death. You

— Jean Baudrillard, L’économie politique et la mort

and I are discontinuous beings . . . . We are discontinuous beings, individuals who perish in isolation in the midst of an incomprehensible adventure, but

Eroticism is the approval of life all the way

we year for our lost continuity.15 For Bataille, death

into Death.

and sexuality are interchangeable in the same temporal cycle: time is both continuous and discon-

— Georges Bataille, Tears of Eros

tinuous , aspiring to a time without time. Bataille was obsessed by the image of the Chinese “tor-

ture of a hundred pieces,” which involves cutting In French, orgasm is referred to as la petite mort

the body of the torturee into numerous pieces. He

— the little death. The ideas of death and sexuality

had seen a photograph of this torture employed at

evoked by this colloquial are explored extensively

the execution of the Chinese regicide Fou-Tchou-Li

in the writings of Sigmund Freud, Georges Bataille,

on April 10, 1905. He was fascinated by the sight

and Marguerite Duras. In Freud’s writings on death

of the “ecstatic,” which he argued had a look of

instinct, he examines the relationship between

alternate pleasure, for “eroticism opens the way

12. C. Herzlich as quoted in Gerard Vincent’s “Le corps et l’enigme sexuelle,” Histoire de la vie privee, Tome 5: De la Premiere Guerre mondiale a nos jours, sous la direction d’Antoine Prost et de Gerard Vincent (Paris: Editions du Seuil, 1987), p. 343. 13. Rick Smolan, Phillip Moffitt, and Matthew Naythons, M.D., Power of Heal, p. 217. 14. Sigmund Freud, The Ego and the Id, Standard Edition (London: Hogarth Press, 1915), vol. xix. 15. George Bataille, Erotism: Death and Sensuality (San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1986), pp. 13 — 15. 16. George Bataille, Erotism, p. 22. 17. Marguerite Duras, Hiroshima mon amour (New York: Grove Weidenfeld, 1961), p.43. 18. Marguerite Duras, The Lover(New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1986), p. 43.

passion and eroticism in the domain of violence.”16 If Bataille viewed death through passion, Marguerite Duras looked at the same equation from the opposite angle, seeing desire as death. For Duras, this space of darkness, violence, and passion, unre-

It’s end is breathtaking

to death and this aura of death is what denotes

strangely liberating site, because passion and death are unbound. This is the sentiment expressed by a character in Duras’ Hiroshima mon amour, who

MAIN ESSAY

deemed by religion, is everywhere. But it is also

states to her lover: “I see my life. Your death. My life that goes on.17 Your death that goes on.” Duras is obsessed with the erotic appeal of death and the deathly allure of passion, because in both one reaches a state of fusion that transcends the boundaries of individual identity. There is continuity in death and desire: “I asked him to do it again and again. Do it to me. And he did, did it in the unctuousness of blood. And it really was unto death.18 It has been unto death.” Turn Your Grief into Anger From eroticism to the tragedy of death. And from the place in our culture where they seem bound together to the places where they are torn radically apart. So many questions remain. In the last few “Chinese Torture of the Hundred Pieces,” 1905. Photo reproduced in Georges Bataille’s The Tears of Eros, 1961

years we have lost so many to AIDS. And with this, other losses. “Between mourning and militancy a new attitude towards death — and life — seems to be evolving,” as Douglas Crimp proposes: Public mourning rituals of course have their own political force, but they nevertheless often seem, from 37

Fig. 4

Fig. 5

Hans Daunser, Medizin I, 1984, Series of 11 black-and-white photographs, 20 × 24” each, Photo courtesy of the Curt Marcus Gallery, New York

their lifetime. Hundreds of diseases remain incurable, among them arthritis, multiple sclerosis, cere-

a rallying cry, at least in its New Age variant, “Turn

bral palsy. Alzheimer’s disease, muscular dystrophy,

your grief into anger,”. . . . Alongside the dismal toll

amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig’s disease),

of death, what many of us have lost is a culture of

lupus, and the common cold.”22 When will it? How will

sexual possibility.

Throughout the centuries the

it end? Has it already ended? What do we mean by

fear of epidemics has always intensified fundamen-

the end? These are just some of the questions It’s

tal social and political divisions of society. In the

End is Breathtaking attempts to address. Frederick

United States the political system has not been fast

Wiseman’s 1989 six-hour, black-and-white docu-

enough to the AIDS crisis because it was thought

mentary, Near Death, filmed in the Medical Intensive

that the majority of the population was not at risk.

Care Unit of Boston’s Beth Israel Hospital, shows

20. Antonin Artaud as quoted in Louis-Vincent Thomas, Mort et Pouvoir, p. 61.

And those who did seem to be at risk “didn’t matter.”

us physicians informing families and friends of

I think of Artaud: “One does not lie because it is

their terminal situations. Having to deal daily with

21. Louis-Vincent Thomas, Mort et Pouvoir, p. 61.

necessary to die, one dies it is a habit of thought

the reality of death, perhaps physicians and other

acquired one day, not too long ago.”

Louis-Vincent

Thomas expands on Artaud’s thought: “It is the

members of the medical profession become aestheticized — become accustomed to the habit of denial

bourgeois society that had introduced into history

by treating patients and counselling their families.

the death instinct in order to better assure its dom-

They immerse themselves in a relentless cure and

ination-reproduction.”21 The activism in response to

speak the hypnotizing language of this new “medi-

the AIDS crisis has grown to encompass and raise

calized” death: “Put the tube back in . . . . Take the

questions about the state of the health care, on a

tube out . . . . Meaningful recovery is remote . . . . I

global scale, with all its disparities and deficiencies.

want what’s best for him . . . . We have to see if we

AIDS — which infects about 10,000 people in the

can get him to fly, and not re-intubate him . . . . Is

world monthly — now requires that we question

he in optimization to maximize it . . . . Do something,

everything: medical research, politics, race and

please do something . . . . We’re doing our best;

class relationships. It is a political tragedy that

it’s a gray area . . . .” And over and over again, the

also serves to illuminate other tragedies. Diseases

doctors asking those frightened, sad people who

without cures and terminal conditions continue

are hoping for the best for their loved ones, “What’s

to afflict great numbers of people. For example:

your sense of what’s going on?”; “Do you have

“Malaria strikes 150 million people worldwide each year, causing some 2 million deaths . . . . Around the

a sense of what’s happening?”; “Do you have an understanding of what’s going on?”

world, smoking kills about 2.5 million people annu39

22. Rick Smolan, Phillip Moffitt, and Matthew Naythons, M.D., Power to Heal, p. 217.

It’s end is breathtaking

defeatist . . . . “Don’t mourn, organize!”— the last words of labor movement martyr Joe Hill — is still

19. Douglas Crimp, “Mourning and Militancy,” Out There: Marginalization and Contemporary Culture, eds. R. Ferguson, Trinh T. M., M. Gever, C. West, (New York: The New Museum of Contemporary Art, 1990), pp. 234 — 238.

ally . . . . 70 million Americans will develop cancer in

MAIN ESSAY

an activist’s perspective, indulgent, sentimental,

40 Fig. 6

Anonymous, Young Girl on Couch with her Doll, c. 1895. Silver print. 8 × 10”. Collection of Stanley B. Burns, M.D. and the Burns Archive

It’s end is breathtaking

Sylvère Lotringer

Sigmund Freud, “Mourning and Melancholia,” The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud (London: Hogarth Press, 1915). vol. xiv Geoffrey Gorer, appendix to Death, Grief, and Mourning (New York: Doubleday, 1963).

With Camera Lucida Roland Barthes turn his back

tense, in any portrait? Death is far more alive in

on semiotics. Photographs, he claims, cannot be

Peter Hujar’s meditative portraits of the living than

read rhetorically (as he once read images) because

in Jerome Liebling’s freak show of the dead. Pho-

they stubbornly stick to the referent. A photograph

tographs of the dead have no punctum. They don’t

is always in a relation and a symptom of Barthes’

move viewer, they “shock” and traumatize. Like

mourning and salive. “This struggle,” Freud

pornography, death dulls the senses and doesn’t

wrote, can be so intense that a turning away from

take us anywhere. Barthes could hardly be said to

reality ensues, the object being clung to through

innovate here. Actually his condemnation is a direct

the medium of a hallucinatory wish psychosis.”

echo of what the English sociologist Geoffrey Gorer

Barthes hallucinated reality through the medium

in 1955, called “the pornography ,” in his book

of photography. The “punctum” he kept invoking is

Death, Grief, and Mourning, published in 1955. One

a detail that punctures the photograph and “fan-

weeps in private, in mourning “as if it were an ana-

tasmically” takes the character off-frame, in a

logue of masturbation.” Paradoxically the positive

blurred, emotional space” where it goes on living.”

quality Barthes assigns to photography — ”you look

Erotic pictures always suggest more than they

at photographs when you are alone” — could also

show. They have subtly, they energize their subject.

apply to the way people nowadays consider death

Photographs of the dead, Barthes suggest, are

photographs. There’s something shameful about

dead pictures because they show everything. They

showing death publicly. Barthes is cautiously trying

are dead pictures. Why represent death “massively”

to guard himself between two extremes: too much

when it is more powerfully present, in the future

meaning — what he calls the “studium,” or recog-

2nd Essay

THE KILLING MACHINE: PHOTOGRAPHY AND DEATH

nizing cultural codes which dull the senses — and

tion could replace meaning, the “studium,” and yet

too much affect, the loss of control that one expe-

not overwhelm the viewer’s experience.

riences with something overwhelmingly emotional. Throughout the book, Barthes condemns “affective”

What Barthes is doing here parallels what he

photography when it directly touches the subject

described as the aim to striptease in his famous

of death, yet devotes most of the book to an effort

essay on the subject published in Mythologies.

to reintroduce affect and subjectivity around other

Striptease, Barthes argues, is meant not to show

subject. Barthes looks through a series of family

the naked body, but to cover it up. Barthes com-

pictures. They evoke nothing to him. Then, suddenly

pares this strategy to vaccination: inoculation with

something does; a childhood picture: his mother

a small dose of the “threat” in order to protect

in the Winter Garden when she was five years old.

oneself from it. In many ways, this is exactly what is

He suddenly discovers “what in photography was

going on in Camera Lucida: Barthes’ identification

essential: [the picture] fulfilled for me utopically

of the “punctum” in a photograph — the stray detail

the impossible science of a unique being.” It’s a

that begs further elaboration — is his means to

very strange book. Nowhere else is Barthes’ rea-

referring to the presence of death in photography

soning so visibly arbitrary and subjective. When

while keeping it outside the frame.

a student remarked to him that he found Camera Lucida’s treatment of death “flat,” Barthes’ some-

And this is what society does on a much larger scale.

what whimsical answer was that flatness is pre-

Explaining his esthetic strategy in an interview

cisely what death is about. Many of the ideas Bartes

about the photographs he took of the Phalange

works with in the hope of gaining some internal

massacre of Palestinian refugees at the Sabra and

conviction that they might actually apply. Each time

Barthes tries to build his personal feelings into

Shatila camps, photojournalist Fadi Mitri said: “People don’t want to see gory things. They won’t

general statement, he fails. But when he addresses

absorb it. They don’t understand it. They keep the

the status of photography with the full power of his

idea out of their minds. Then, as a journalist, you

contemporary society, Barthes writes, “Death must

haven’t succeeded in putting your message across

still be somewhere. If not (or less) in religion, then

[if you foist this imagery upon them].” What Miltri

somewhere else: maybe in this photographic image

does, then, is to show corpses within a larger field

which produces Death while trying to preserve life.”

that tells the story of the conflict, so that the

Photography becomes the ultimate fetish, the only

viewer’s gaze has somewhere else to go. The

means of honoring the dead — and this brings him

picture has to “explain” — or at least offer the

back to himself and his morning. Camera Lucida is

spectator some visual relief. Otherwise, they will not

an attempt to devise new codes through which emo-

see the corpse at all. News photographs stress the

Sylvere Lotringer and Fadi Mitri, “Framing Death,” Impulse, vol.10(4) (Toronto, 1983)

Friendrich Nietzsche, The Genealogy of Morals, 3, xx.

Every hurtful debauch of feeling, all that shatters,

to someone’s slaughtered body wouldn’t tell any-

bowls over, crushes and transports, every secret of

thing. It could apply to anyone, anywhere. It would

the torture chamber, the ingenuity of hell itself, had

have no meaning. A close up of someone’s slaugh-

been finally discovered and exploited.” It is the

tered body wouldn’t tell anything. It could apply to

sadistic regimen that Bataille and Artaud reappro-

anyone, anywhere. It would have no meaning.

priated in lieu of religion. Bataille’s obsession with

Paradoxically, Journalistic “human interest” creates

photographs of the execution of Fu-Tchou-Li, a

distance: it allows the viewer to look at the most

young Chinese regicide is well-known. The man, tied

distressing scenes of violence and destruction and

up to a big bamboo, is cut alive in “one hundred

say: “Not me!” Information and narrativity allow us

pieces” with a stern crowd attending. Bataille got

to present death, but at the same time they make it

the first print from his analyst, Adrien Borel, in

disappear. And this is what a vaccines does. What

1925 and eventually acquired the whole set. Every-

makes a picture of death acceptable? Talking about

thing about them seemed to him “intolerably beauti-

his work as police videographer in Chris Kraus’ film,

ful.” The scene worked like a wild kind of fantasy,

How To Shoot A Crime, Johnny Santiago says:

Bataille alternatively identifying with the executioner

“You’ve gotta keep the eye moving. So long as you

It’s end is breathtaking

differentiating — qualities of war victims. A close up

2nd Essay

longer complained of pain but were insatiable for it.

amputating the man’s leg, or with the truncated,

keep the eye moving, you keep the horror of it, you

blooded victim. The ecstatic expression on the man’s

keep the shock value of it, to a minimum.” Because

face will haunt him throughout his life. Unlike

death has been banished to the realm of the

Barthes, Bataille didn’t care for subtle metonymic

unknown in mediated culture, to confront it head-on

details (a young man in the crowd peers at the

would be paralyzing. But isn’t it revealing that there

victim over someone else’s shoulder). Bataille

exists no code or methodology for death in a society

wasn’t a Christian — he was worse: a mystic of

that rushes to satisfy — even creates — every other

death. Contemporary practitioners of S&M belong

need? This “lack” is, in fact one of its most chilling

to a different world. Dungeon Master, their maga-

creations. Denial of death? Yes, but on whose part?

zine, warns: “Use your head, don’t lose it! S&M sex

And for what purpose? All great religions have used

can, and frequently should, be rough and painful —

horror and cruelty explicitly to achieve their own

that’s what it’s all about. But it should also be safe.”

purposes. The ascetic priest sank the human soul

In a society that mythologizes individual initiative,

deep in terror not in order to cure the guilt (erase

contemporary S&M wants to make it real. Hence the

the debt), simply to relieve depression. Then,

popularity of what Michel Foucault considered the

Nietzsche sarcastically adds, living once again

most original American creation. The Master’s

becomes a highly interesting business: “People no

violence is a form of “shock-therapy” meant to 43

“human factor”: that is, the identifying — and

“explode” his partner’s most crippling anxieties and through death looms on the horizon as the ultimate

eye moving in still photography? You establish a

challenge, contemporary S&M is more practical

dialectic between the “human factor” in the back-

than mystical. Anxiety is a floating affect in search

ground (tank rolling in the dust, a veiled woman

of a cause. Freud located its origin in the individual.

fleeing with her baby). Information keeps the eye

Its indefinite character, he projected outward on to “the power of destiny.” Freud saw anxiety as a

that is a pure result of fear.” How do you keep the

moving away from the site of the gore. But the composition of the picture can provide a similar

symptom of neurosis; for Nietzsche it lies in the

protection. In a photograph of the Civil War, the eye

process of socialization. The most profound trans-

first focuses on the charred body of a black slave

formation humanity ever underwent was its domes-

that hangs from a rope at the center of the scene,

tication. Instead of relying on their instincts, people

but swiftly moves away from this unbearable sight to

suddenly were forced to think, calculate, anticipate,

take in the crowd that surrounds it, then to a man

weigh cause and effect — “unhappy people, reduced

peacefully standing at the foot the stake, looking

to their weakest, most fallible organ, their uncon-

straight in the direction of the photographer. And

scious!” It is this unhappy consciousness that S&M

another man, on the other side of the stake, looking

tries to control through physical violence: a con-

sideways at him. When the viewer’s finally manages

sciousness that spontaneously evaporates in panic

to return to the charred remains of the slave, the

situations when crowds run amok at the slightest

emotion is already of a different kind. It occupies

threat of danger. How can photography account for

another mental space. The relationship between the

the loss of boundary that is at the core of these

corpse and the man, this eye quietly looking at us

experiences? For the most part S&M photographs

looking from what was initially an unbearable sight.

arrest its effects by fetishizing the body (Robert

A similar journey occurs in Jeffrey Silverthorne’s

Mapplethorpe) or aestheticizing the situation (Jimmy

photograph, Listen . . . The Woman Who Died in Her

Desana). The contemporary rendering of the panic

Sleep. Except that, in this case, the eye is not at

that occurred during the inauguration of the

first attracted to the body, lying naked before us

Brooklyn Bridge shows the same retraction in front

with one arm raised under her head, exposing her

of the contagion of violence: in the midst of the

breast. The woman seems to be asleep. Her eyes

chaos that ensued, each body, each individual’s

are closed, her face slightly ashift, revealing her

characteristics, were carefully delineated. After he

delicate features. The frame of the photograph cuts

vainly tried to build a fiction around Nicholas Ray’s

off our view of her slim nude body just below the

dying (Lightning Over Water), Wim Wender’s finally

navel, as if to somehow respect her privacy. Then

had to recognize that, “The film, whatever we did,

the eye notices something that crosses her chest,

looked very clean, pretty — like licked off. And I think

her whole naked torso, something that had been

Sigmund Freud, “Inhibitions, Symptoms, and Anxiety,” The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud (London: Hogarth Press, 1925). vol. xx.

like a big black necklace, or a heavy cord. Then one realizes: this woman is lying on a dissecting table and she’s been cut up in a Y-shape. The woman is dead, and yet the erotic beauty of her body makes this death somehow unreal. Going back and forth

It’s end is breathtaking

there all along but so far unscrutinized, something

cut, the eye is somehow fascinated by the sight, and the dreary reality of this morgue picture is made manageable, even appealing. When I asked Silvert-

2nd Essay

from the cut to the flesh and from the flesh to the

horne about this picture, he began by explaining: “It was a hot summer day, not a hot, but a warm summer day, very romantic and very heavy air and she was beautiful, just beautiful. She was the only one, as I recall, in the morgue at the time. It was a perfect time to fall in love. It sound strange to say, it was just so physical, the delicacy of her gestures like a very delicate dance.” According to Fadi Mitri, the second element that makes a death picture acceptable is the image’s power to titillate: “You have to make death glamorous, you have to make it look good and attractive, even the goriest parts.” Hoping to draw attention to the Palestinian plight by producing world-consumable images, Mitri was careful to frame his pictures within our culture’s criteria of acceptability: “the aim is to put the message across to the outside world that war is “Chinese Torture of the Hundred Pieces,” 1905. Photo reproduced in Georges Bataille’s The Tears of Eros, 1961

gory, without showing the gore of it. That’s the challenging part.” One wonders how effective this actually is, because with the acceptability of this imagery comes its banality, and absorption into the information-flow that is so much a part of the smooth operation of daily life. While glamour 45

Fig. 4

Fig. 8

Bob Berg, “Untitled” from “The Naked Aberration,” 1990. Black-and-White silver gelatin print. 20” × 20”. Photo courtesy of the artist.

Fig. 8

Bob Berg, “Untitled” from “The Naked Aberration,” 1990. Black-and-White silver gelatin print. 20” × 20”. Photo courtesy of the artist.

David Wojnarwoicz, Close to the Knives (New York: Random House, 1991).

tipping amazonian blow darts “infected blood” and

normalize the act of dying itself. Elizabeth Kubler-

spitting them at the exposed necklines of certain

Ross, a Swiss psychiatrist working in Chicago,

politicians or government health-care officials or

designed a series of workshop to help medical

those thinly disguised walking swastikas that wear

personnel cope with deaths they experienced on the

religion garments over their murderous intentions

job — since death, in mainstream American cul-

or those rabid strangers parading against AIDS

ture, has long ago been displaced from the fabric of

clinic in the nightly news suburbs . . . Unfinished

everyday life and shunted into the hospital. Kubler-

business.

Ross identified and characterized four stages in

It’s end is breathtaking

death, American psychology has lately sought to

an individual’s coping with his or her own death. Patterned after Freud’s four stages of sexual masturbation, the designation of these stages — denial, anger, depression, and acceptance — was meant to make things easier for the patient, the medical caregivers, the family. While one must admire KublerRoss’ courage in wanting to address an obvious and timely “problem,” it’s impossible not to be outraged by it. Just a look at Avedon’s eight portraits of his dying father, exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in 1947, precludes any thought of acceptance. The anger, defiance, and terror on Jacob Israel Avedon’s face are so raw and as to be unbearable. For most people, the realization that they are dying forces them to reassess and question everything they had taken for granted about their lives so far. This is especially true in time of AIDS: “I wake up every morning in this killing machine called America,” David Wojnarowicz writes, and I’m carrying this rage like a blood-filled egg and there’s a thin line between the inside and the outside a thin line between thought and action and that line is simply made up of blood and muscle and bone and 47

I’m waking up more and more from daydreams of

2nd Essay

normalizes the disruptive and upsetting images of

THERE ARE MORE DEAD pEOplE THAN lIvING. AND THEIR NUMBERS

IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING

ARE INCREASING. THE lIvING ARE GETTING RARER. — EUGENE IONESCO

jAN wEENIx

IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING

jAN wEENIx

ITâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S END IS BREATHTAKING jAN wEENIx

jAN wEENIx Jan Weenix was the most celebrated Dutch exponent of the hunting still life and gamepiece during the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century. He also painted Italianate scenes, genre subjects, flowerpieces and portraits. He was particularly admired for his monumental, decorative gamepieces, many of which feature a dead hare as the central motif, surrounded by smaller game and hunting accoutrements. The subject is often set amidst antique

statuary with a dramatic landscape in the distance.

BIOGRApHY Jan Weenix (1642, Amsterdam — buried September 19, 1719, Amsterdam ) was a Dutch painter. He was trained by his father, Jan Baptist Weenix, together with his cousin Melchior d’Hondecoeter. Like his father, he devoted himself to a variety of subjects, but his fame is chiefly due to his paintings of dead game and of hunting scenes. Many pictures in this genre formerly ascribed to the elder Weenix are now generally considered to be the works of the son. His date of birth is not exactly known. Also the year in which his father died is a puzzle. The family lived in a castle outside Utrecht, but his father died young and in poverty, after he went broke. Weenix was a member of the Utrecht guild of painters in 1664 and 1668. By the age of twenty Jan Weenix rivalled and then subsequently surpassed his father in breadth of treatment and richness of colour. In 1679 when 54

Jan Weenix married Pieternella Backers he told the sheriff he was “around thirty”!

visiting the Republic to study shipbuilding, science

of his life lived in a house on the Amstel, was buried

and the art of fortification building. At that time Jan

in a nearby church on Rokin.

Weenix was employed to decorate a private house near the Admiralty of Amsterdam. The mansion, on

Many of his best works are to be found in English

a canal with many rich Sefardim, with a view on

private collections. Though the National Gallery,

the park and in to a long avenue, was owned by a

London has only a single example, a painting of

Spanish merchant, involved in sugar plantations in

dead game and a dog, the Wallace Collection, also

South America. The five fixed paintings or wallpa-

in London, has a number of paintings, including the

per on canvas became very popular in the second

intriguingly disturbing “Flowers on a Fountain with

half of the 18th century, when nature and Rousseau

a Peacock.” Jan Weenix is well represented in the

were fashionable and copied. The wallpaper sur-

galleries of Amsterdam, The Hague, Haarlem,

vived in the house until 1921. Then the enormous

Rotterdam, Berlin, and Paris. A medium sized

“paintings” were sold by the nuns — who moved in

Weenix, “Still Life with Dead Game” hangs in the

— to William Randolph Hearst in a private arrange-

dining room of the Filoli estate in California. A

ment. After Hearst went broke, the paintings have

certain “Still Life with Hunting Trophies” hangs in

been dispersed; one is in the National Galleries of

the Ackland Art Museum, Chapel Hill, NC. “Boy with

Scotland in Edinburgh, two are in Hotel Carlyle in

Toys, Pet Monkey and a Turkey” is in the Kresge

New York, one is in the Allen Memorial Art Muse-

Art Museum.

IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING

ing dead deer or hare. Jan Weenix, who at the end

jAN wEENIx

In 1697 he made a portrait of Peter the Great,

um since 1953 and one is lost. Between 1702 and 1712 Weenix was occupied with an important series of twelve large hunting pictures for the Elector Palatine Johann Wilhelm’s castle of Bensberg, near Cologne. Also Eglon van der Neer, Rachel Ruysch, Adriaen van der Werff had a very good relation with the court, being paid well or knighted as ridder and most probably meeting an international crowd of artists and musicians. The treasury was empty when Jan Wellem, as he was called in Düsseldorf, died. Most of this collection is now at the Munich Gallery, but the paintings of Van der Werff moved to the 55

cellar. Also Jan Weenix seems to be forgotten, paint-

ITâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S END IS BREATHTAKING jAN wEENIx 3

2 3

It’s end is breathtaking Jan Weenix 5

Jan Weenix, Dead Swan, 1700 — 1719 Jan Weenix, Dead Game and Small Birds, 1700

4 5

IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING jAN wEENIx 6&7 7

Jan Weenix, Falconer’s Bag, 1695

AND wHEN THEY’RE GONE, HE’S fORGOTTEN, wITHOUT A TRACE, AS If

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HE’D NEvER EvEN ExHISTED. AND THAT’S All. — wOlfGANG BORCHERT

pOllY MORGAN

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pOllY MORGAN

It’s end is breathtaking POLLY MORGAN

POLLY MORGAN As a child, when it came to death, it was the decaying part I had difficulty with. I could accept the departure of the soul: after all, I’d seen plenty of things break and stop working. But in my house, they didn’t always get thrown away; they would just be given a different purpose. If a bird no longer had use for its body then I’d have liked it as an ornament or inanimate pet, warm and soft in my pocket. Instead, I’d be told to find a matchbox or shoebox to bury the body in and would say goodbye for good. Once while out shopping, my sister complained of a headache. My mother reached into her handbag to pull out an Anadin box. She proffered the open box, only to scream as a small hard hamster slid out onto my sister’s palm. I must have picked up the wrong box and given some painkillers a funeral.

with the dead, but in less upsetting ways I hope.

And here I am twenty years on, still fraternizing

It’s end is breathtaking POLLY MORGAN

BIOGRAPHY Inspired by her East London surroundings and the

on any of their animals that had died, paying just

artists that lived there during her student days,

as much as was demanded for a live bird to avoid

Polly Morgan started to practise taxidermy and

unnecessary killings. Now animals are donated by

started to produce sculptural work in 2004. Polly’s

friends, family and word of mouth in the event of a

work steps outside of traditional taxidermy practis-

pet death or occasional finds. Polly’s cites the Sur-

es, catching the attention of notable collectors and

realists, Charnel Houses, George Jamieson and high

creators including Banksy, who commissioned her to

rise buildings as just some of her inspirations, but

create work for his annual Santa’s Ghetto exhibition

essentially her work is instinctive and reactionary in

just off Oxford Street. Whereas most taxidermists

relation to each individual piece. Morgan first ex-

strive to make their animals appear alive, Polly’s

hibited in 2004 at London’s Bistrotheque restaurant

creations are kept in their state of decease. Her

and has gone on to have work displayed in White

settings play on the themes of mortality, beauty and

Cube Gallery, Attingham Park, Pangolin London and

the ephemeral - Still Birth sees the suspension

the Guildhall Art Gallery as well as internationally in

of a chick from a delicate balloon in a tiny bell jar,

Germany, Ireland and Cyprus.

with the chic poised gracefully like a fallen Grecian heroine and the balloon acting as the carriage taking the spirit up to the afterlife. Polly is careful with how she sources her animals, taking a proacoften go to bird fairs and ask sellers there to pass

tive approach. When first starting out, she would

pOllY MORGAN

IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING

IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING pOllY MORGAN

THE ENDlESS plAIN Endless Plains interprets this vast expanse of land,

their prone carcasses to nourish an avaricious flock

at once barren and teeming with life, in perverted

of birds.

and unusual ways. The result is an unflinching portrait of the savagery of nature, where the sacrifice

Circumventing the ‘traditional’ trophy taxidermy

of one life for dozens more is a vital and constant

that sought to animate the subject, Morgan avoids

exchange. Shortly after this journey, the artist had

anthropomorphosis and instead meditates on the

an encounter with her own mortality, developing

significance of the departure of life in her work.

life-threatening peritonitis and gangrene, where

Endless Plains is a meditation on death as pro-

part of her own body died and went under the

cess — both hierarchy and commodity, as parasites

scalpel. This experience is evident in much of her

become hosts, maintaining balance through blood-

new work, where bodies are rent wide, their cavities

shed.

seething with life.

Morgan brings her own carcass into the gallery in

to expose a latent romance and narrative in the

the shape of a hollowed out stag, filled with resting

corpse. By appropriating the Victorian art of taxi-

bats. Elsewhere a fallen tree, hollow and rotten, is

dermy, she updates the traditional notion memento

hung with plump piglets gorging themselves from

mori to interrogate themes including the cultural

its ‘teats’ like parasites. Sap runs, like milk, down

mythology around death, birth and the afterlife.

their chins as they suck the life out of it. The piglets

The sculptures tap into the uncanny; the fine line

become a central image in Morgan’s new work,

between animate and inanimate capturing the imagi-

completing the chain as mushrooms sprout from

nation of audiences and critics worldwide.

Morgan’s early work manipulated scale and context

IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING pOllY MORGAN 5

Polly Morgan. Hide and Fight, 2012

1&2&3 &4&5

IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING pOllY MORGAN 6&7&8

Polly Morgan. Carrion Call, 2009

wHEN HE DIED, All THINGS SOfT AND BEAUTIfUl AND

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BRIGHT wOUlD BE BURIED wITH HIM. — MADElINE MIllER

DAMIEN HIRST

IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING

DAMIEN HIRST

IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING DAMIEN HIRST

DAMIEN HIRST The black and white photography is blown up but not

collapsed blood vessels. This ambiguous mass is set

immodestly proportioned — it measures fifty-sev-

in turn on a tangle of white cloth — perhaps the

en by seventy-six centimetres — and mounted on

head was wrapped for storage — that extends out

an aluminum support, so that it status is some-

of the frame at the bottom right-hand corner, as if

where between an image and a sculptural object.

to connect the viewer to the two heads, which are

As a composition, it is unremarkable: no doubt it

themselves linked by the perfect alignment of their

was hastily taken, for reasons made clearly by its

eye lines. (The eyes of the radically curtailed corpse

content. On the left is a smiling young man (he was

are closed, the features gathered together in what

sixteen at the time) with dark bristling hair and a

seems oddly like an expression of disgust.) They

chunky ribbed sweater, leaning low over a polished

look, this grinning boy and his new dead acquain-

steel surface, the raised and squared-off edge of

tance, like the traditional graphic personifications

which reveals it to be a mortuary table. The young

of Comedy and Tragedy: one maniacally beaming of

man is looking directly at the camera and grinning

guffawing, the other frowning and puckered, mouth

broadly, perhaps a little too broadly to convince us

down-turned.

fat, bald, severed head of a man in late middle age.

Hirst recalled in 1992, the smile was a result of his

The jowls are subtended by what must be a remain-

panic in the literal presence of the pact of death:

ing portion of the man’s neck, although (and this

‘if you look at my face, I’m actually going: ‘Quick.

might be the most disturbing aspect of the whole

Quick. Take the photo.” It’s worry . . . I’m absolutely

scene) it is hard to tell exactly what one is looking

terrified. I’m grinning, but I’m expecting the eyes to

at in the way of of bone and gristle, fat, sinew, and

open and for it to go: “Grrrrraaaaagh!”

of his levity, because besides him on the table is the

in order to make life drawings (‘With Dead Head’ (1991). The experiences served to establish the difficulties he perceived in reconciling the idea of death in life. Of the prominence of death in his work (‘A Thousand Years’ (1990)) he has explained: “You can frighten people with death or an idea of their own mortality, or it can actually give them vigour.” At Goldsmiths, Hirst’s understanding of the distinction between painting and sculpture changed

BIOGRAPHY

significantly, and he began work on some of his most important series. The ‘Medicine Cabinets’ created in his second year combined the aesthetics of minimalism with Hirst’s observation that, “science is the new religion for many people. It’s as simple and as

Damien Hirst was born in 1965 in Bristol and grew

complicated as that really.” This is one of his most

up in Leeds. In 1984 he moved to London, where he

enduring themes, and was most powerfully mani-

worked in construction before studying for a BA in

fested in the installation work, ‘Pharmacy’ (1992).

Fine Art at Goldsmiths college from 1986 to 1989. He was awarded the Turner Prize in 1995.

Whilst in his second year, Hirst conceived and curated ‘Freeze’ — a group exhibition in three phases.

Since the late 1980’s, Hirst has used a varied

The exhibition of Goldsmiths students is commonly

practise of installation, sculpture, painting and

acknowledged to have been the launching point not

drawing to explore the complex relationship

only for Hirst, but for a generation of British artists.

between art, life and death. Explaining: “Art’s about

For its final phase he painted two series of coloured

life and it can’t really be about anything else …

spots on to the warehouse walls. Hirst describes

there isn’t anything else,” Hirst’s work investigates

the spot paintings as a means of “pinning down the

and challenges contemporary belief systems, and

joy of colour”, and explains they provided a solu-

dissects the tensions and uncertainties at the heart

tion to all problems he’d previously had with colour.

of human experience.

It has become one of the artist’s most prolific and recognisable series, and in January 2012 the works

Hirst developed his interest in exploring the “un-

were exhibited in a show of unprecedented scale

acceptable idea” of death as a teenager in Leeds.

across eleven Gagosian Gallery locations worldwide.

From the age of sixteen, he made regular visits to the anatomy department of Leeds Medical School

arguably his most famous series. Through preserv-

num cast of a skull set with 8,601 flawless pavé-set

ing creatures in minimalist steel and glass tanks

diamonds, at the White Cube exhibition ‘Beyond Be-

filled with formaldehyde solution, he intended to

lief’. The following year, he took the unprecedented

create a “zoo of dead animals”. In 1992, the shark

step of bypassing gallery involvement in selling 244

piece, ‘The Physical Impossibility of Death in the

new works at Sotheby’s auction house in London.

Mind of Someone Living’ (1991) was unveiled at the

Describing the sale as a means of democratising the

Saatchi Gallery’s ‘Young British Artists I’ exhibition.

art market, the ‘Beautiful Inside My Head Forever’

The shark, described by the artist as a “thing to

auction followed Hirst’s Sotheby’s event in 2004, in

describe a feeling”, remains one of the most iconic

which the entire contents of the artist’s restaurant

symbols of modern British art and popular culture

venture, Pharmacy, were sold.

It’s end is breathtaking

spectacular, ‘For the Love of God’ (2007): a plati-

Damien Hirst

In 1991 Hirst began work on ‘Natural History’,

in the 90’s. The series typifies Hirst’s interest in display mechanisms. The glass boxes he employs

Since 1987, over 80 solo Damien Hirst exhibitions

both in ‘Natural History’ works and in vitrines, such

have taken place worldwide and his work has been

as ‘The Acquired Inability to Escape’ (1991), act to

included in over 260 group shows. Hirst’s first ma-

define the artwork’s space, whilst simultaneously

jor retrospective ‘The Agony and the Ecstasy’ was

commenting on the “fragility of existence”.

held in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale in Naples in 2004. His contribution to British art over the last

Since his involvement in ‘Freeze’ in 1988, curatorial

two and a half decades was recognised in 2012 with

projects have remained important to the artist. In

a major retrospective of his work staged at Tate

1994 he organised the international group exhibi-

Modern.

tion ‘Some Went Mad, Some Ran Away’ at the Serpentine Gallery. Over a decade later, and explaining

Hirst lives and works in London, Gloucestershire

that he considers collections to constitute a “map of

and Devon.

a man’s life”, he curated an award-winning exhibition of work from his ‘Murderme’ collection: ‘In the darkest hour there may be light’ (2006, Serpentine Gallery). Stating: “I am absolutely not interested in tying things down”, Hirst has continued over the last decade to explore the “big issues” of “death, life, 85

religion, beauty, science.” In 2007, he unveiled the

ITâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S END IS BREATHTAKING DAMIEN HIRST 3

1&2&3

Damien Hirst, The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, 1991

4 5 4&5

Damien Hirst, Black Sun, 2004

DAMIEN HIRST

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IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING DAMIEN HIRST 6

6 7&8

Damien Hirst, No Fear, 2008 Damien Hirst, Symphony In White Major.... Absolution II, 2008

Damien Hirst

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I AM BECOME DEATH, THE

IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING

DESTROYER Of wORlDS. — j. ROBERT OppENHEIMER

jEffREY SIlvERTHORNE

IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING

jEffREY SIlvERTHORNE

IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING jEffREY SIlvERTHORNE

jEffREY SIlvERTHORNE Jeffrey Silverthorne explores the question of sex and death, as well as the notions of boundary and transgression. Active since the end of the 60’s, he has been accumulating series on extreme subjects: a slaughter house, a morgue, brothels or a community of transvestites and transexuals. His works are not out of voyeurism. Rather, Silverthorne seeks a way to further expose himself, to become more vulnerable so as to dive deeper into his own psychology, once stating, “I make images to remember, not the purpose, but my own feelings and reactions.” Hence his lack of interest for an objective photography that would translate nothing of the intensity of the experience and, on the contrary, his liking for subjective documentaries and structured images shaped as plastic experiments and stage

productions.

100

It’s end is breathtaking Jeffrey Silverthorne

BIOGRAPHY Jeffrey Silverthorne explores the question of sex

ical look at his generation’s fascination for extreme

and death, as well as the notions of transgression,

subjects which do not serve the interest of the

transformation and transcendence. Active since the

image, where solely the feeling counts. Silverthorne

end of the 60’s, he has been accumulating series on

steps outside of himself and turns to the absolute

extreme subjects: a morgue, brothels, a community

other that his subjects are for him. His is not part of

of transvestites and transsexuals. His attraction to

a trend but increased vulnerability, deeper explora-

extreme subjects is shared by other photographers

tion of his own psychology, continued revelation. In

of his generation. His era is indeed the one when

1988 Silverthorne stated: “I make pictures so I will

Garry Winogrand declared that everything is pho-

remember, not the subject, but how I felt about it,

tographable and when critic A.D. Coleman observed

how I responded to it.” Each series is both a phys-

that photographers prefer repulsive images. The

ical and a psychical experience. Given these condi-

social and political climate — with the affirmation

tions, it is easy to see Jeffrey Silverthorne’s utter

of a counterculture, minorities claims, revolutions

disinterest in the objective photographie and on the

for human and civil rights and the Vietnam War — is

contrary, his preference for subjective documentary

part of the explanation. As is the very direct influ-

and images structured in scenes and visual

ence from Diane Arbus. In fact it was when Arbus

artistic experiments.

refused to take photographs in a morgue that Silverthorne was driven to explore the subject. With 101

time however Jeffrey Silverthorne now casts a crit-

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ITâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S END IS BREATHTAKING jEffREY SIlvERTHORNE 1 2 3

Jeffrey Silverthorne, Young Woman, 1972 Jeffrey Silverthorne, Beating Victim, 1972 Jeffrey Silverthorne, Crib Death, 1972

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104

105

Jeffrey Silverthorne

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ITâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S END IS BREATHTAKING jEffREY SIlvERTHORNE 4 5

Jeffrey Silverthorne, Lovers, Accidental Carbon Monoxide Poisoning, 1972 Jeffrey Silverthorne, Scott Looks at Carol, 1972

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IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING jEffREY SIlvERTHORNE 7

Jeffrey Silverthorne, Boy Hit by Car, 1972 Jeffrey Silverthorne, Home Accident, 1972

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6 7

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SINCE THE DAY Of MY BIRTH, MY DEATH BEGAN ITS wAlK.

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IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING

IT IS wAlKING TOwARD ME, wITHOUT HURRYING. — jEAN COCTEAU

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HENRY HARGREAvES

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HENRY HARGREAvES

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IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING HENRY HARGREAvES

HENRY HARGREAvES Photographer Henry Hargreaves has made a name for himself by using food as a vehicle for the provocative, charming, and even macabre. “People have such an intimate connection with food, but it’s hardly ever shot or considered beyond food porn,” the 35-year-old New Zealand-born Hargreaves says. His most technically complex feat, which he did in collaboration with Caitlin Levin, involved reconstructing some of the world’s most iconic museums and galleries — think licorice-laced Louvre pyramids — made out of gingerbread and other sugary confections, which he exhibited during 2013’s Art Basel. More recently, at the Venice Biennale, he documented death-row inmates’ final meals graphically styled in his No Seconds series, synthesizing elements of the human condition with horrific vio-

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lence and the mundane.

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It’s end is breathtaking Henry Hargreaves

BIOGRAPHY Hargreave grew up in Christchurch, New Zealand

was fascinated about peoples requests and what

and studied from pre school all the way to Univer-

they ordered said about their character and per-

sity there. Photography was always a hobby but he

sonality. He tries to bring this idea into his work by

never studied it. When he began working in fashion

showing the connections visually.

in the early 2000’s Hargreave wanted to be the guy calling the shots behind the camera, so literally went

When asked what would be his last meal, Henry

out and brought a camera and began to play and

answered, “I couldn’t stomach any food if i knew I

see if he could get this thing to take nice pictures.

was going to die but if I was a famous rock star I’d want Miller High Life beer, oatmeal and raisin cook-

Although Henry Hargerave shoot very different sub-

ies and fresh fruit plate.”

ject matter there are a lot of lighting techniques and tricks he picked up and a sense of balance within a composition Hargreave felt a successful collaboration blurs the lines between specific roles, the photographer can become the artist/stylist and vice versa.

before being able to be a full time photographer. He

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Henry Hargreave always worked in the food industry

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Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s end is breathtaking Henry Hargreaves 1 2

Henry Hargreaves, Angel Nieves Diaz, 2014 Henry Hargreaves, Victor Feguer, 2014

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Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s end is breathtaking Henry Hargreaves 3 4

Henry Hargreaves, Timothy Mcveigh, 2014 Henry Hargreaves, Stephen Anderson, 2014

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Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s end is breathtaking Henry Hargreaves 5 6

Henry Hargreaves, Ted Bundy, 2014 Henry Hargreaves, Ronnie Lee Gardner, 2014

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Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s end is breathtaking Henry Hargreaves 7 8

Henry Hargreaves, John Wayne Gacy, 2014 Henry Hargreaves, Ricky Ray Rector, 2014

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THE TIMING Of DEATH, lIKE THE ENDING Of A STORY, GIvES

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A CHANGED MEANING TO wHAT pRECEDED IT. — MARY BATESON

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EMMA KISIEl

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EMMA KISIEl

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IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING EMMA KISIEl

EMMA KISIEl Born in Buffalo, New York, now living in Colorado Springs, Emma’s work focuses extensively on the human influence on animal life and documents her physical closeness to animals, both living and dead. The subjects of her series have included roadkill, animal shelters, the dog overpopulation problem on the Navajo Nation, animals in zoos, petting zoos, and pet stores, and taxidermy, dead animals, and animal parts in documentary and still life settings. Even as a child, Emma was drawn to dead birds that would appear on her front lawn and roadkill she spotted while walking to the bus stop. She realized that the immobility and lifelessness of these animals allowed her an intimacy that she couldn’t achieve with a

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living wild animal.

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It’s end is breathtaking Emma Kisiel

BIOGRAPHY Emma Kisiel holds a bachelor of fine arts with an

While at times repulsive and confrontational, Kisiel’s

emphasis in photography from the University of

photographs draw attention to the preciousness of

Colorado Denver. Her work has been featured online

animals and the importance of a relationship with

on Lenscratch, Esquire Magazine Russia, F-Stop

them, in a sincere and genuine form.

Magazine, Feature Shoot, Juxtapoz Magazine, and the Huffington Post, and in print in BLINK Magazine and Shots Magazine. Kisiel is also the author of the blog and online artist index, Muybridge’s Horse. Emma Kisiel’s photographs are an exploration of the ways in which we as humans experience and interact with animals. Kisiel uses photography to document and ponder her emotional and physical closeness to animals, both living and dead; the significance and future of taxidermy in museums of natural history; and the 21st century culture of places where visitors can experience captive and preserved animals. Often, her images question the mals, as well as our comfort with our own mortality.

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authenticity of the moments we share with ani-

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Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s end is breathtaking EMMA kisiel 1 2

Emma Kisiel, At Rest, 2011 Emma Kisiel, At Rest, 2011

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Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s end is breathtaking EMMA kisiel 3 4

Emma Kisiel, Down to Sleep, 2011 Emma Kisiel, Down to Sleep, 2011

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Emma Kisiel, At Rest, 2011 Emma Kisiel, At Rest, 2011

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Emma Kisiel, At Rest, 2011 Emma Kisiel, Down to Sleep, 2011

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SOMEONE HAS TO DIE IN ORDER THAT THE REST Of

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US SHOUlD vAlUE lIfE MORE. — vIRGINIA wOOlfE IT’S END IS BREATHTAKING

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INTERvIEwS

ITâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S END IS BREATHTAKING

The following are excerpts from a series of interviews conducted by Los Angeles County of Museum of Art staff members France Morin, Alice Yang, and Russel Ferguson during the spring and summer of 1991.

INTERvIEwS

Do you remember the first time you actually thought about death? That you were asking yourself what it meant? Ruby Mcneil: I don’t know. But I think, yeah, it was a long time ago Do you remember if it related to something that

RUBY MCNEIL

happened that happened? RM: I think so. What do you remember? RM: Well, I remember I had a dream about a mother and she had to choose which people had to die. In her family? RM: Uh-huh, and not in her family.

Ruby Mcneil is the seven year-old daughter of an artist and a curator. This interview was conducted in Ruby’s bedroom.

How long ago did you have this dream? RM: Last night. Really? Is it because you were thinking about this interview? RM: No. I just was thinking about something else and it just went into this. I don’t know why. I have very strange dreams, and I don’t know why this happened. And who did the mother choose? RM: Well, she choosed three boys and she choosed the husband . . . and a man. And that’s it. Was the mother in your dream somebody you knew? RM: Umm . . . I was in the dream. You were in the dream? And was it your mother? RM: No. Do you know why she had to choose? RM: Well, because these ghosts came and said “You have to pick which people have to die.” Because

146

the house was haunted, and they slept there. The ghosts chanted magic to get them dead, and at the

RM: Yeah.

In what ways is it wonderful?

What do you think it means when somebody dies?

RM: Well, you get to rest. And rest is wonderful,

RM: Well, it means you have to die. Because if you

because you get to rest from being this way.

didn’t die, it would be too crowded in the world.

What way?

But death means sometimes a punishment for

RM: From, you know, when you stay alive and you

something, or it might be that you are tired and

stay alive for a long time, then you kind of get

something happened, or just you were going around

tired, and then you have to die and then you can

and something happened.

rest from being alive.

What do you mean by a punishment

So you think that it’s good because people get

RM: Maybe a punishment from something that you

to rest?

did to a person.

But in a way, that’s bad. Your friends can’t really

With your friend Stuart, was it a punishment?

see you and you miss your friends and you might be

RM: it wasn’t a punishment. It was just that

sad to miss them or something.

something came in his body and killed his cells. But

In the dream, did the mother have any girls, any

sometimes death is wonderful, or it is not wonder-

daughters?

ful, or it may be . . .

RM: Yes, she had a daughter. She had me . . .

Why do you think it is wonderful?

She had one? She had you as a daughter?

RM: Well, not really. But, sometimes you can miss

RM: She had two.

someone because if someone wakes up and dies in

And she decided it would not be the daughters

the middle of the night, you may be sad because

who died?

you want to see him die . . . .

RM: Yeah, no daughters, no daughters!

To say something to them before they die?

So she decided that the people who had to die were

RM: Yeah, or you wanted to go over their funeral,

the three boys and her husband, and another man.

but you missed it or something, and you really feel

Who was the other man?

sad, or you may miss a person.

RM: He was just a man somewhere and mother

Do they get afraid sometimes? Let’s say that the

didn’t know him. But he wanted to get married be-

people around you, your mother, your father, your

cause the husband was dead. And the mother said

grandparents, or people very close to you, died. Do

no, but maybe you should come because there’s

you think about that sometimes?

ghost around here, and I have to pick who dies, and

RM: I think about it, but I’m scared about when

I don’t want to kill my daughter, so maybe I will

I die. Because I don’t know what it feels like, I’m

have to kill you because I don’t want to go dead.

really scared.

It’s end is breathtaking

is wonderful in one way, but bad in some ways.

Interviews

And then you woke up?

147

end they just came alive and this is something that

148

You’re scarred. What do you think it feels like?

if there is a heaven or not, okay? I don’t know if

RM: Well, I think it feels like you’re

there’s a God, so I don’t believe in God. So, uhm-

slowing down.

mm, they go someplace or whatever, or they can go

You’re slowing down?

in the world. They can go around.

RM: Yeah. And you don’t have very much energy and

Are you telling me that the body is not too important,

you feel like you can’t get up. I think it’s like that,

because once somebody dies, there is a spirit?

but maybe that’s not right. But I’m just afraid that

RM: No. Because a body is important, because you

I’m going to die, and I just don’t want to die. I wish

can tell and see and smell and touch and do stuff.

my mommy and daddy and me didn’t die.

That’ when people are alive.

Have you known many people who died?

RM: Yeah, that’s important. But what’s important

RM: Not really. I know this guy who smoked and

when you’re dead is that you can rest, or in some

I know this person, Stuart, who had blood put in,

ways, what’s important is that people miss you.

and you know those dangerous things that put

And what happens to the spirit you’re talking about?

blood in different parts of thousands of people, and

RM: It goes around. I know another person named

one person has AIDS and they didn’t know and they

Dennis, and he had AIDS too. He had AIDS and he

put it in Stuart’s blood.

died. But, um, see, in a way, you can miss people.

Were you with those two people that you know when

Because Dennis was really nice, he took me to the

they died?

Pizza Hotel and he gave me some treats and I love

RM: I don’t think so. No. But, I’ve known other peo-

him, but it was really bad that he didn’t remem-

ple, an uncle, and a friend, and an aunt, and lots of

bered that that happened when he died. And those

people. I feel sad for them and sorry that they died

people I

because they got sick. I don’t feel that they should

really love.

do that. I don’t feel like that should happen, be-

Do you think about Dennis sometimes and feel that

cause they might be sad or they don’t think it’s re-

his spirit is with you?

ally good that they don’t want that to happen. But

RM: Yeah, yeah, I feel like that. If you think of a

my mom’s not afraid of death. I’m a little afraid.

person, they’re next to you

What about your father?

and their spirit is next to you. And you

RM: Well, my father? He’s a little afraid of death.

can think that they’re really next to

He’s not that much . . .

you forever.

And what do you think happens to people

Is the spirit like a very nice ghost then?

after death?

RM: Yeah, in a way. But its really . . . when you die,

RM: Well, once they’re dead they have a spirit and

you’re young again.

the spirit comes out and goes up. I don’t know

Why, when people die, do they get young again?

RM: Four.

spirit when you die, your spirit is young. It’s

How do you feel about that?

not old.

RM: Pretty sad, and pretty scary

Is it young, or are you saying that your spirit stays

Are you careful when you cross the streets and

the same?

things like that? Do you think about death?

RM: It’s old, and it’s young and free.

RM: I think very careful, if I’m going to run out.

So the body can get old, but the spirit stays young?

Because in Santa Barbara I can cross the street

How about other things that die? Do you think about

by myself.

animals or plants? Do you think it’s different

Because there are less cars.

for them?

RM: And I look both ways.

RM: Yes, because the head might rip off. Because

How else do you learn about death?

in our backyard we had a buried pigeon, which is

RM: Well, my mother and father speak to me

dead and the head is cut off a little and it’s leaning

about death.

on the side and cut off and kind of swinging.

How about stories on TV? Do you ever see TV shows

And you buried him?

about death?

RM: Uh-huh. It’s a she.

RM: I seen a book about death.

Were you alone when you found the pigeon?

What does it talk about?

RM: No, I was with a friend.

RM: There are these haunted stories, about ghosts

Were you scared?

and things, and this girl gets blind and then she

RM: No, we were sad.

gets run over by her father. So she’s blind and her

You started to say that you think it’s

father doesn’t recognize her. Then she dies.

different for a pigeon to die than it is for

Do you think that’s a scary book?

a person to die.

RM: I like it.

RM: Yeah, because it has different parts, and if

What do your parents tell you about death?

it has different parts it dies in a different way. It

RM: About death? They tell me that, um, don’t be

may get a different

afraid about death, and they tell me death is a way

disease that no human being can get.

of believing things sometimes. Like you can believe

Have there ever been any children that you know

you’re going to God, or you can believe you’re going

that died?

to heaven, or you’re going anywhere.

RM: I didn’t know this kid, but there was a kid. He

And where do you think you are going if you were

was standing out on a window, and then he jumped

to die?

down and he killed his self.

RM: If there was a heaven, I would go there, but

It’s end is breathtaking

be old, because that’s the way I believe. And your

Interviews

How old was he?

149

RM: Well, because when something dies you can’t

if I didn’t want to go there, I could go around the world. That’s good. But you still prefer to stay alive? RM: Yeah. Is there anything else you like to tell us about death? RM: I don’t think so . . . Is there anything you want to know? RM: Yes. Um, well, when something dies . . . have you ever had a pet that died? Who was it? A cat. RM: The cat that I met? No, those cat are still alive. (Laughter.) Another cat, when I was younger. RM: How old were you? I was about twelve. RM: Is your cat still buried?

150

Yes

tremely violent place where people are dying left and right. But you live there. How do you feel about it? Do you think of it that way? TS: Well, people do die mostly about everyday. But it’s not like you’re going to be seeing it every minute while you’re walking through the neighborhood or something. The neighborhood looks like people would be, like, infected with some diseases by all the abandoned buildings — abandoned buildings

Interviews

TYRONE SOTO

It’s end is breathtaking

Many people think of the South Bronx as an ex-

for blocks and blocks. When you go on the highway, you can just look down and it looks like something out of World War !!.

dinary Puerto Rican from the Bronx.” While attending John F. Kennedy High School in the Bronx, he participated in The New Museum’s High School Art Criticism course, and subsequently worked as an intern at the museum. He graduated from high school in January of 1991, and plans to enter college in the fall. This interview took place at The New Museum.

And the violence? TS: There’s violence as fas as little neighborhood or gang wars maybe. But most people don’t litter where they eat, understand? They’ll live somewhere else and come into the neighborhood since it has a bad reputation. They live in Queens somewhere in a better neighborhood, and come here and do their dirty work. I guess, I was thinking that since you said people die everyday. TS: Yeah, well there’s people dying everyday, but it’s not like you would run into a pile of dead people right there. Sometimes you won’t know that someone died until a couple weeks later or more. Go through the neighborhood and you overhear someone talking, “Oh, this guy fell off the roof . . . “ Is AIDS a big problem in your neighborhood? TS: I don’t known if people die from AIDS or just a drug overdose. I try not to think about it much. But it’s something to think about. Tell Spike Lee to

151

Tyrone Soto describes himself as an “out-of-the-or-

152

make a movie about that.

did. But I was wondering about violence — access

As you know, we’re doing an exhibition on death.

to guns, violent images on TV, that sort of thing.

What do you think about death?

TS: Violence is realistic. TV is not trying to tell

TS: If I were to be dead, and still be able to see

anyone to go and do violence, it just wants to be

things and learn, I think it would be a privilege

real. It has the violence which occurs in the world.

to die.

In fact, I think TV should actually show death.

Do you think that’s possible? Do you think we can

Some TV programs — the only thing they show

learn after death?

is the shootings. They don’t show the aftermath,

TS: Well, death is suppose to be the opposite of

the death, whatever. I see a show and a cop gets

life. What does it have? Advantage on something?

shot, but you don’t see his parents, you don’t see

So your question is “What does death have to

his funeral, nothing like that. The show keeps on

offer us?”

going. At the end, it’s like, “Oh I’m sorry he got

TS: Yes, that’s a quote. With a question mark

shot.” Well yeah, then the show finishes. And then

behind that one.

it comes on next Tuesday. TV doesn’t let the kids see

Has anyone close to you died?

what violence really does, how it affects. So that’s

TS: Oh, yeah. In 1989, my friend’s mom passed

the problem with TV.

away. She passed away away a week before her

Do you think that death affects teenagers in the

birthday and mine. She had cancer. It was hard

South Bronx differently than it affects teenagers in

on my friend, because he’s had a hard life. Then to

other areas of New York or in other cities?

have your mom pass away just makes things hard-

TS: No, not really. If someone sees their parent die,

er. Your guide just disappears. You have no one to

and that’s one thing. But if it’s some stranger, they

guide you.

don’t feel anything.

Do you think death affects teenagers or young

You’re saying that the biggest thing that everyone

adults more now, or in a different way than it

experiences is the death of their loved ones?

did before?

TS: Yes.

TS: It affects us. But when it comes to a relative,

Is death something that you think about in your

it’s different. Because when it’s someone else, it

daily life?

doesn’t really hit you, it doesn’t affect you that

TS: Yeah, I think about it. I think about how it

much. I feel everyone has to die. IF life isn’t all

would be. I wonder, as I said, if it would be

that good for them living, then it’s best for them to

a privilege.

die. That’s my personal opinion.

Do you think about your own death or do you think

So what you’re saying is that death doesn’t neces-

more about the death of other people?

sarily affect teenagers any more now that it ever

TS: No, I think about my own death. I think about

How would you like it to be? TS: I want a lot of people there, about a thousand or more people. What do you want them to do? TS: Nothing, just come and respect me. To acknowl-

It’s end is breathtaking

how my funeral would be.

that this was a good man, always did the best he can. Is there anything else you want to say?

Interview

edge the person I was while I was living. To say

TS: Yeah. I want to call on a phrase that my friend told me: “When Death comes knocking at your door, give generously.” It’s true. And I want to recite a poem I wrote. It’s Untitled,by Tyrone Soto. Ok, prepare yourself because it’s short. And you could listen to it again and think about it. It goes: We are specks of dust With a world within us. We live in a world That lives in a world

153

That’s a speck of dust.

Watching a peaceful death of a human being reminds us of a falling star; one of a million lights in a vast sky that flares up for a brief moment only to disappear into the endless night forever.

154

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Elisabeth KĂźbler-Ross

155

Exhibitions Jan Weenix N/A 1753 1886 1978 1983 1984 1999

156

2006 2007 2008 2009 2009 2010 2010 2011 2011 2011 2012 2012 2013 2013 2013

Damien Hirst

“The Art of Jan Baptist Weenix and Jan Weenix.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Delaware, Newark, Denmark. De Groote Schouburgh der Nederlantsche Konstschilders en Schilderessen. 3 vols. in 1. The Hague, Netherlands. “Biografische aanteekeningen betreffende voornamelijk Amsterdamsche schilders…” Oud Holland 4, Amsterdam, Netherlands. “Der Jagdzyklus des Jan Weenix aus Schloss Bensberg.” Weltkunst 48, Hamburg, Germany. “The Early Italianate Genre Paintings by Jan Weenix.” Oud Holland 97, Amsterdam, Netherlands. The Dutch Gamepiece. Montclair, New Jersey, United States. Still-life Paintings from the Netherlands, Cleveland Museum of Art, Zwolle, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, Netherlands.

1991 1992 1992 1993 1993

Polly Morgan

2003

Still Life After Death, Kristy Stubbs Gallery, Dellas, Texas, London, United States. The Exquisite Corpse, Trinity Church, 1 Marylebone Road, London, United Kingdom. You Dig the Tunnel, I’ll Hide the Soil, White Cube, London, United Kingdom. Mythologies, Haunch of Venison, London, United Kingdom. The Age of the Marvellous, All Visual Arts, London, United Kingdom. Psychopomps, Haunch of Venison, London, United Kingdom. Contemporary Eye: Crossovers, Pallant House Gallery, Chichester, United Kingdom. Passion Fruits, ME Collectors Room, Berlin, Germany Burials, Workshop Venice Dead Time, Voide Derry, Londonberry, United Kingdom. Endless Plains, All Visual Arts, London, United Kingdom. 10,000 Hours, Kunstmuseum Thurgau, Switzerland. Foundation/Remains, The Office Gallery, Nicosia, Cyprus The Nature of the Beast, The New Art Gallery, Walsall, United Kingdom. Beasts of England, Beasts of Ireland, VISUAL Centre for Contemporary Art, Glasgow, United Kingdom.

2003 2005

1994 1994 1994 1995 1996 1997 2000

2005 2006 2006 2007 2007 2008 2009 2010 2010 2010 2012 2013 2014

In and Out of Love, Woodstock Street, Kilmarnock, United Kingdom. When Logics Die, Galerie Emmanuel Perrotin, New York, United States. Internal Affairs, Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami, United States. Visual Candy and Natural History, Regen Projects, Los Angeles, United States. Damien Hirst: The Acquired Inability to Escape/ The Acquired Inability to Escape, Inverted and Divided and Other Works, Galerie Jablonka, Poland. Current 23, Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States. A Bad Environment for White Monochrome Paintings, MattressFactory A Good Environment for Coloured Monochrome Paintings, Deutscher Akademischer Autausch Dienst Gallery Still, White Cube, London, United Kingdom. No Sense of Absolute Corruption, Gagosian Gallery, London, United Kingdom. The Beautiful Afterlife, Galerie Bruno Bischofberger, Männedorf, Switzerland. Theories, Models, Methods, Approaches, Assumptions, Results and Findings, Gagosian Gallery, London, United Kingdom. From the Cradle to the Grave: Selected Drawings, The 25th International Biennale of Graphic Arts, International Centre of Graphic Arts, Ljublijana, Slovenia. Romance in the Age of Uncertainty, White Cube, London, United Kingdom. The Agony and the Ecstasy: Selected Works from 1989 — 2004, Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, Napoli, Italy. The Elusive Truth, Gagosian Gallery, London, Kingdom. The Death of God — Towards a Better Understanding of a Life Without God Aboard the Ship of Fools, Galeria Hilario Galguera, Mexico. Corpus: Drawings 1981 — 2006, Gagosian Gallery, London, United Kingdom. Superstition, Gagosian Gallery, London, United Kingdom. Damien HirstL Life, Death and Love, Kunsthuset Kabuso, Øystese, Norway For the Love of God, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, Netherlands. Requiem, PinchukArtCentre, Ukraine. Cornucopia, Oceanographic Museum of Monaco, Monaco. Dark Trees, Galeria Hilario Galguera, Mexico. The Souls, Paul Stolpher Gallery, United Kingdom. Utopia, Paul Stolpher Gallery, United Kingdom. Entomology Cabinets and Paintings, Scalpel Blade Paintings and Colour Charts, White Cube, Hong Kong, China. Relics, ALRIWAQ, Qatar Museums, Doha, Qatar.

It’s end is breathtaking 2014 2015 2015

The Psalms, McCabe Fine Art, Stockholm, Sweden. Signification (Hope, Immortality and Death in Paris, Now and Then), Deyrolle, Paris, France. Schizophrenogenesis, Paul Stolpher Gallery, United Kingdom, Black Scalpel City Scapes, White Cube, São Paulo, Brazil. LOVE, Paul Stolpher Gallery, United Kingdom.

2011 2012 2013 2013 2013 2013 2014 2015

Jeffrey Silverthorne 2015 2009 2009 2011 2012 2014

Tout l’univers...,VU’ LA Galerie, Paris, France. DJÀN. Atiq Rahimi and the Artists of the Galerie VU’ ,VU’ LA Galerie, Paris, France. Travel Plans, VU’ LA Galerie, Paris, France. Le Monde-autre, VU’ LA Galerie, Paris, France. Portraits: 1968 — 2012, VU’ LA Galerie, Paris, France.

2014 2014 2015

Henry Hargreaves No Seconds, Herter Gallery, Massachusetts, United States. Henry Hargreaves, The Lunch Box Gallery, Miami, Florida, United States. Last Meal, Bushwick Open Studio, Bushwick, Brooklyn, United States.

2015

At Rest, BFA Thesis Exhibition, UCD, Emmanuel Gallery, Denver, CO Society for Photographic Education Southwest Regional Juried Exhibition, The Center for Fine Art Photography, Juror: Jim Robischon, Fort Collins, CO The Magic of Light, PhotoPlace Gallery, Juror: Aline Smithson, Middlebury, VT PhotoSpiva 2013, Spiva Center for the Arts, Juror: Natasha Egan, Joplin, MO Tales They Told Us, Lexington Art League, Lexington, KY Tiempo para los Muertos, Featured Photographer, FATVillage, Fort Lauderdale, FL 120 for $120, Center for the Arts Evergreen, Evergreen, CO SPE Combined Caucus Juried Show, New Orleans Photo Alliance, Jurors: Deborah Willis and Carol McCusker, New Orleans, LA Members of the Society for Photographic Education: Selections from the Annual Photo Exhibition, University of Central Florida Art Gallery, Orlando, FL Still No Mountains in the Way, University of Kansas Art & Design Gallery, Lawrence, KS

INDEX

2014 2014

2008 2008 2009 2010 2010 2011 2011 2011

Juried Foundation Exhibition, Main and Decker Galleries, Baltimore, MD Juried Undergraduate Exhibition, Decker Gallery, Baltimore, MD Photography Spring ‘09, Main Gallery, Baltimore, MD Contemporary Directions and Practices in Photography, Fall ‘09, Main Gallery, Baltimore, MD UCD Student Art Exhibition, Partnership Gallery, The Courtyard by Marriott, Denver, CO UCD Juried Student Show, Emmanuel Gallery, Denver, CO UCD Student Art Exhibition, Partnership Gallery, The Courtyard by Marriott, Denver, CO Dreams, The Center for Fine Art Photography, Juror: Aline Smithson, Fort Collins, CO

157

Emma Kisiel

WORKS Jan Weenix 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Jan Weenix, Still Life of Game including a Hare, Black Grouse and Partridge, a Spaniel looking on with a Pigeon in Flight, 1680 Jan Weenix, Hunting Still Life, 1991 Jan Weenix, Gibier et armes de chasse., 1837 Jan Weenix, Dead Swan, 1700 —1719 Jan Weenix, Dead Game and Small Birds, 1700 Jan Weenix, Falconer’s Bag, 1695 Jan Weenix, Falconer’s Bag, 1695

Jeffrey Silverthorne 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Jeffrey Silverthorne, Young Woman, 1972 Jeffrey Silverthorne, Beating Victim, 1972 Jeffrey Silverthorne, Crib Death, 1972 Jeffrey Silverthorne, Lovers, Accidental Carbon Monoxide Poisoning, 1972 Jeffrey Silverthorne, Scott Looks at Carol, 1972 Jeffrey Silverthorne, Boy Hit by Car, 1972 Jeffrey Silverthorne, Home Accident, 1972

Henry Hargreaves Polly Morgan 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Polly Morgan. Hide and Fight, 2012 Polly Morgan. Hide and Fight, 2012 Polly Morgan. Hide and Fight, 2012 Polly Morgan. Hide and Fight, 2012 Polly Morgan. Hide and Fight, 2012 Polly Morgan. Carrion Call, 2009 Polly Morgan. Carrion Call, 2009 Polly Morgan. Carrion Call, 2009

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Henry Hargreaves, Angel Nieves Diaz, 2014 Henry Hargreaves, Victor Feguer, 2014 Henry Hargreaves, Timothy Mcveigh, 2014 Henry Hargreaves, Stephen Anderson, 2014 Henry Hargreaves, Ted Bundy, 2014 Henry Hargreaves, Ronnie Lee Gardner, 2014 Henry Hargreaves, John Wayne Gacy, 2014 Henry Hargreaves, Ricky Ray Rector, 2014

EMMA KISIEL Damien Hirst

158

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Damien Hirst, The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, 1991 Damien Hirst, The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, 1991 Damien Hirst, The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, 1991 Damien Hirst, Black Sun, 2004 Damien Hirst, Black Sun, 2004 Damien Hirst, No Fear, 2008 Damien Hirst, Symphony In White Major....Absolution II, 2008 Damien Hirst, Symphony In White Major....Absolution II, 2008

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Emma Kisiel, At Rest, 2011 Emma Kisiel, At Rest, 2011 Emma Kisiel, Down to Sleep, 2011 Emma Kisiel, Down to Sleep, 2011 Emma Kisiel, At Rest, 2011 Emma Kisiel, At Rest, 2011 Emma Kisiel, At Rest, 2011 Emma Kisiel, Down to Sleep, 2011

“Agence VU - Jeffrey Silverthorne.” Agence VU - Jeffrey Silverthorne. Web. 28 Mar. 2016.

It’s end is breathtaking INDEX

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Agamben, Giorgio. Language and Death: The Place of Negativity. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota, 1991. Print. France Morin, Massimo Vignelli, The interrupted life, New York: New Museum of Contemporary Art. 1991, Print. Hirst, Damin, Ann Gallagher, and Michael Craig-Martin, Damien Hirst. Milano, Print. Hirst, Damien, Francesco Bonami, Abdellah Karroum, Michael Craig — Martin, and Nicholas Serota, Damien Hirst: Relics, Milano, Italy: Skira, 2013. Print. Hirst, Damien, and Gordon Burn. On the Way to Work. New York, NY: Universe, 2002. Print. Hirst, Damien, and Stuart Morgan. Damien Hirst: No Sense of Absolute Corruption. New York: Gagosian Gallery, 1996. Print. “Home.” Emma Kisiel. Web. 28 Mar. 2016. “Jan Weenix.” The National Gallery. The National Gallery, n.d. Web. 27 Mar. 2016. Kvaran, Gunnar B., Hanne Beate. Ueland, and Grete Årbu. Damien Hirst: Life, Death and Love. Oslo: Astrup Fearnley Museet for Moderne Kunst, 2007. Print. “NO SECONDS by Henry Hargreaves | Still Portfolios.” Dripbook. Web. 28 Mar. 2016. “Polly Morgan.” Polly Morgan Home Comments. Web. 28 Mar. 2016. Searl, Edward. Beyond Absence: A Treasury of Poems, Quotations, and Readings on Death and Remembrance. Boston: Skinner House, 2006. Print.

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Silverthorne, Jeffrey. Jeffrey Silverthorne: Photographs. Stuttgart, Germany: Galerie A, 1993. Print.

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