how do you portray death?

Some good books/photogs of death photography: Don McCullin; Evidence ed. Luc Sante; Ghosts along the Mississippi Laughlin; Weegee; Meatyard; Wisconsin Death Trip; Hollywood Babylon; Time-Life books about WWI-II; War Against War Friedrich;
 
JoeV said:
In earlier times, such as medieval European art, death was symbolized by a hand over the head or forehead, or a black hand; which later became symbolic of the Black Hand of organized crime, in Italy.

In contemporary times death is often noted by one's absence from the venue of the mechanized or built environment, since in living we seem to habitat our built environment almost exclusive of feeling at one with the natural world. As such, the attached photo illustrates how I symbolize death.

Photo taken in the backyard of my deceased father's house. 8"x10" preflashed paper negative in cardboard pinhole box camera, about 1 minute exposure, F275.



~Joe
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I like yiour photo, and your explanation.
 
The OP's question doesn't make sense, since death is not an emotion.
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yeah, poor wording... sorry. but most people got the point anyways. I was a bit tired...

It causes emotions in the living: all kinds of different ones, ranging from grief to glee.
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so lemme rephrase. how would you capture that grief, or glee? (more biased to the darker side of that...)

JoeV's example is good. any others? (johnastovall, your link didn't work for me...)
 
dragunov said:
yeah, poor wording... sorry. but most people got the point anyways. I was a bit tired...


so lemme rephrase. how would you capture that grief, or glee? (more biased to the darker side of that...)

JoeV's example is good. any others? (johnastovall, your link didn't work for me...)
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There's no answer to this! You take a picture of it if you see it. Some say(e.g. Susan Sontag) that all photography portrays death, it is all evidence of what has ceased to exist. And if you think that's hard, try returning a dead parrot!
 
It's been mentioned in this forum before, but you can check Barthes' Camera Lucida for a discussion of the relationship between photography and death. He claims that the photograph cannot help but portray death, in the sense that photographs always point to something that is no longer, an absence... Benjamin has also spoken of photography as a mode of bereavement, along similar lines.
 
Watch this multimedia slideshow by one of the pioneers of the internet and of digital photoraphy, Pedro Meyer. It's called "I Photograph to Remember" and it's about the death of his parents.

http://www.zonezero.com/exposiciones/fotografos/fotografio/

Warning: this is a 35 minute presentation and it's emotion-packed so get a box of tissues before you start. Meyer shot this on film in the pre-digital era and it was originally released on a CD-ROM. But now he's got it on the website he founded, zonezero.com.
 
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I did it this way:
crop0009_8x10.jpg


That's my dad, in Salvador Brazil in May 2006 when my mom suffered a sudden and severe ruptured brain aneurysm - she never recovered and died in June when we were able to bring her home.

That photo and a few others I took always, to me, will signify death...

Dave
 
When you see his scythe, lift your camera and shoot.

And do look at the Japanese pictures of Gene Smith, please. Such a weighty topic can not be thrashed about on the i-net, I believe. It will take your whole soul to enter into a photo contest with death of a relative or friend. Have you seen the Annie Leibowitz pics of Susan Sonntag dying? Look and see ...

And maybe leave this territory to others; you seem not ready to cross the Hades with camera in hand.
 
see Manuel Alvarez Bravo. His is a pic of a dead young worker at a political parade.
one of the most beautifull images in photography.
 
uhligfd said:
When you see his scythe, lift your camera and shoot.

And do look at the Japanese pictures of Gene Smith, please. Such a weighty topic can not be thrashed about on the i-net, I believe. It will take your whole soul to enter into a photo contest with death of a relative or friend. Have you seen the Annie Leibowitz pics of Susan Sonntag dying? Look and see ...

And maybe leave this territory to others; you seem not ready to cross the Hades with camera in hand.
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Add to that list Avedon's pictures of this dying father.

Leibowitz and Avedon were the inspiration for my Cancer Ward.
 
ClaremontPhoto said:
There is a tradition in a part of the southern USA of photographing dead people just before their funeral.
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Really!, it's not just a southern US thing. Working in photolabs in Canada, I've seen a few photos of deceased in in caskets at funeral homes. I think of it as something older generation of Europeans might be into. I'm sure there are other cultures that do the same.

Some of the most interesting photography I've ever seen of work regarding death is by Jeffery Silverthorne

Be forewarned, this is an interesting news article from the Telegraph in UK, but some of the images are difficult and Not Safe For Work!!
 
Correct. Portraits of departed family members were a major use of photography throughout the U.S., if not the entire Western world, in the late 19th century. Remember that lifespans were shorter in that era & funerals were often held in family homes (the parlor). An article on the phenomenon: http://www.americandaguerreotypes.com/ch3.html

JOE1951 said:
Really!, it's not just a southern US thing. Working in photolabs in Canada, I've seen a few photos of deceased in in caskets at funeral homes. I think of it as something older generation of Europeans might be into. I'm sure there are other cultures that do the same.
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I'm working on a series of my fathers grave (died last November) over the year - he's buried in an old-style churchyard a short stone's throw away from my home which will show the progress of the seasons in the trees and the quality of the light. For some reason those photos want to be on big negatives with slow cameras: I shot the first ones with a Mess Ikonta and I'm going to move to 4x5 for the rest.

Picking up a camera during the couple of days in ICU after his heart attack or in the immediate aftermath never occurred to me: I'm not sure if this is a good or a bad thing.
 
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