Photos of deceased family

[tkluck]

I asked a friend who also happens to be a funeral director.
The funeral director can find a discrete moment to take a picture for you. Leave him the camera and pick it up later. Usually, they keep a poloroid around for just this purpose. Not uncommon in parts of the south and other cultures.
Not common in this part of the US, but he said he's done it, and that he remembered covering the subject in some detail in mortician school.
Oddly enough he seemed a bit sqeemish about it, and he's embolmbed his own reletives.

 

[JJW]

Looking at Death

Looking at Death

Photographing the dead in coffin was actually very common among all social classes before the Second World War. I worked as a photographic archivist in my youger days and I spend many hours going through the negative collections of dozens of small town and "main street" photographers who were active during the late 19th through mid 20th century. I saw hundreds of funeral photos taken in the south, north, west and midwest.

Relatives often wanted last photographs of their relatives, as there may not have been many pictures taken of the person in life. American attitudes towards death have also changed. Death used to be more accepted as part of life. Many of these photographs of the dead I saw were taken in people's parlors and homes.

I would go ahead and photograph your uncle since that may be the last time you would have the chance. Photographs preserve memory. A person is actually dead when they are forgotten.

Just ask the funeral director for access to the coffin outside of normal family viewing hours. Make sure no one who would be offended is present. And share the photos with your wife. Don't show them to anyone else who would be offended.

No need to have someone else do it for you, either. You're the photographer. He's the funeral director. (If he were a great photographer, he would be doing something else for a living, I am sure.)

I would suggest this book for all those interested in the subject:

http://www.godine.com/books/titles/0879239646.html

One of the best treatments of the subject of photographing the dead.

 

[FrankS]

I'm not sure how you can be squeemish about anything after embalming your own relatives.

Wasn't there a photographer who made his schtick (I mean artistic statement) photographing corpses (in Mexico)?

 

[XAos]

When Dad was terminally ill - I did attempt to take pictures but tried really really hard to take happy pictures with grandkids, and not make him feel uncomfortable about it. When he went in the hospital - I took pictures of other family members (Mom's birthday occured during this - yea I know, thems the breaks I guess) He does appear in one picture, the first day in the hospital, but when he was strong enough to sit up and hug one of the youngsters. In the months after he passed, Mom was upset with me for not having taken more pictures, but I feel I did the right thing passing up as many as I did. Dad was scared, and it would have been selfish to make him uncomfortable so we could have pictures after he passed. In retrospect - I think Mom might have been better served by NOT having as many pictures and remembrances.

After he died, mom wanted me to take a picture in the casket. I did, but did NOT like it one little bit. Dad's sisters thought it creepy as well. I knew Dad wouldn't have wanted it either. It's almost impossible to talk about death without talking about beliefs, and many if not most customs about death & burial stem from various interpretations about afterlife and resurrection. Dad felt (and I'm probably about the only person I know that feels quite as strongly as he did about this) that God doesn't need the same dirt that made up my carcass to make me a new body on that day. Dirt's dirt, and he is God after all. Doesn't matter if I get eaten by sharks, burned and scattered, shot into space, or eaten by cannibals (who then get saved, only to be eaten by their uncoverted brethern, and so on ad infinitum). But Dad would have just thought it absurd or vain, and I still have to deal with Mom for a little while longer, so I went with her wishes. In the final analysis funerals are always more about the living than they are the deceased.

 

[ch1]

I in general agreement with the majority that find this request a bit too much.

However, if it is really important to your wife I would suggest that you ask for a few moments alone in the viewing room and take the pics w/o freaking out other mourners.

Just tell folks you like a little final "private time" with your uncle and they will surely accomodate your request.

 

[willie_901]

One of my Uncles just died and I'll be going to his funeral. My wife will be unable to attend. She never met my Uncle, nor has she even seen a picture of him. She asked me to take a photo... you know, in the casket.

Brian,

It seems to me this issue depends entirely on your uncle's closest relatives. I think you should ask them for permission. If you think they might be offended or upset by the request, then you should not take the photo.

Alternately you could ask the funeral director to take the photo (as others suggested) and your uncle's survivors would likely never know the photo exists.

I think the suggestion of asking for a copy of his most recent photo is good advice.

Condolences,

willie


p.s. I stumbled upon an in-casket photo on FLICKR a while back and it really got my attention. The photographer indicated the subject was a family member (an uncle as well) and that he had permission. He also took a shot from the back of the funeral parlor. I really didn't know what to think about this.

 

[kbg32]

"Death" photos were quite popular in the late 1800s.

 

[bmattock]

Also, when child mortality rates were high, photos of dead children posed to make it look like they were sleeping were very popular - there were photographers who specialized in it. Seems a little creepy now, but if it gave comfort to the families of the children, who can judge right and wrong?

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

 

[FrankS]

who can judge right and wrong?

No mortal.

 

[XAos]

I just reread this and saw your wife has never met this uncle. In THAT case - I would definately say - go find some pictures from grandmas scrap book or something. If she didn't know him, then she doesn't really have the basis to request such a photo. It's not like she needs closure - which would be the primary reason for such photos. It would be much better to show her pictures from his life.

I know a lot of folks here strive to shoot ART shots. But don't forget the snapshots. And don't forget once in a while to include silly stuff that you might not think about at the time. Today the car in the background might be a distraction from little Tiffany's first bike ride. In 30 years, it might be context. "Oh remember back when we had the convertible, Honey!" Things like the house you live in, the car you're driving, the price on the gas pumps on your vacation shot - the pets you have sometimes get cropped out in today's current rage of commercialized scrapbooking.

 

[ampguy]

sure there's no connection??

sure there's no connection??

lol! the camera used for these 2 pics wouldn't have happened to have been the radioactive fed 5 would it?? 😀

An intersting question as my imediate answer would be 'no', but I have on two occasions taken a picture of someone who has, unexpectedly died, shortly afterwards. (There was no connection!!!) which are now treasured 'last photos' by their relatives. I guess at the end of the day it is down to the individuals concerned and their wishes. As CVBLZ4 says sometimes it is best to put the feelings of others before our own and not be too judgmental.....

 

[Cooki]

I've never seen someone take a photo at a wake or funeral - I'm with you, I wouldn't do it.
Plus, you'd have a devil of a time getting the model release form signed.
🙂

It strikes me as an odd practice, but, here in Winnipeg we have a large Polish/Ukranian/Russian population and we get a number of funeral shoots brought in to the shop by a couple of the older Slavic photographers. It must be a cultural thing.

 

[kully]

This is one of those polarising things, my Dad asked me to take some photos of his uncle when he died - I felt really weird all over doing it (and my g/f wanted them out of the house ASAP when they came back from the developers (and she's Catholic)).

I think this may not be cultural, but rather more personal. Perhaps in the same way some people have 'outie' and others 'innie' belly buttons.

 

[BrianShaw]

I think this may not be cultural, but rather more personal. Perhaps in the same way some people have 'outie' and others 'innie' belly buttons.

I think you've hit the nail on the head. Perhaps my wife and I don't see eye-to-eye on a few things because I have an outie and she has an innie.

 

[wtl]

One of my Uncles just died and I'll be going to his funeral. My wife will be unable to attend. She never met my Uncle, nor has she even seen a picture of him. She asked me to take a photo... you know, in the casket.

who is she again? No, I am not asking you, I am asking her.

if your uncle's family asks for it, i would.

if your wife asks for it, i would ask her why...

 

[VinceC]

In the first 70 or so years of photography, photographs of the dead were not uncommon. An especially poignent practice was to photograph dead children as though they were asleep ... child mortality was high, and there was a good chance that there were no other photographs of the child. So these were a way to remember. Especially before the 1880s, photo emulsions were so slow that it was all but impossible to photograph any living child.

 

[BrianShaw]

who is she again? No, I am not asking you, I am asking her.

if your uncle's family asks for it, i would.

if your wife asks for it, i would ask her why...

Yes, I understand your question. And, yes, I agree with your suggestions.

 

[lushd]

This has been the subject of some serious academic study:

http://www.highbeam.com/library/doc...6118&ctrlInfo=Round20:Mode20e:DocG:Result&ao=

 

[bmattock]

Freaks like it too - www.rotten.com

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

 

[Jocko]

My brother died after a long illness. Sitting beside him, not long before the end, I was suddenly struck by how much he resembled the dying man in Hogarth's "Gin Lane".
I was very tired and to my own astonishment found myself composing mental photographs of his poor, battered body. I could not believe I was doing this, but with hindsight I recognise it as a defense mechanism: a way of distancing myself from the situation and remaining calm when others needed me to be so.

I suspect that images of the dead or dying are - oddly - often a way to avoid the reality of death; to reduce it to a picture. As such - from my own viewpoint - I doubt if they can do much good, not least because they fix the memory of a life at a period often characterised by intense vulnerabilty and indignity. Better one happy memory than an album of such pictures. I think.

Ian