I've chosen to talk about a light hearted subject... Death.
"Mama always said dying was a part of life, I sure wish it wasn't"
- Forrest Gump
As a society we seem to be captivated by death, but very ignorant to it aswell.
Take the soap operas for example. Almost every Christmas there is a death in East Enders or Coronation Street etc. and just Soap Operas in general, It's a guaranteed way to boost the ratings.
More than 10 million people tuned in to itv on (21/01/14) as Hayley Cropper, sick with incurable pancreatic cancer, took an overdose with drugs and died in the arms of her loving husband Roy. Some praised the storyline for its sensitive handling of illness and death but others said it risked encouraging suicides.
Everyone dies, it's one of the indisputable facts in this world,
"In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes."
- Benjamin Franklin
It's a subject we see everywhere, on tv and in films, in popular culture and in the newspapers. It's a thing that happens every day but it's also a topic we rarely discuss with one another.
It was Oscar Wilde who once said:
'Life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about.'
And maybe that goes for death as well...
I'm not saying that it's something we should discuss every morning over our bowls of corn flakes, but it is something we should discuss with one another more openly. Although, as death is a very subjective thing it can vary from person to person I.e in their beliefs, personal experiences: such as losing a loved one.
I'm researching this topic in my self directed work and I've come across quite a bit of misunderstanding and readily dismissal from some without listening to why I've done the practises I've done and the things I've researched.
Take the charnel houses situated throughout Europe and the "catacomb saints"
I've been looking at two books by critically acclaimed author and photographer Paul Koudanaris:
The Empire Of Death ( A Cultural History Of Ossuaries And Charnel Houses)
Heavenly Bodies
(Cult Treasures & Spectacular Saints From The Catacombs)
Here are some photographs from the books; I won't list all the details but the so called " catacomb saints" are mostly situated in German speaking regions of Europe and came about from Rome after the Protestant reformation in which saw a vast array of catholic relics destroyed. Known as "catacomb saints" because under a vineyard (Bartolomeo Sanchez, Italy) in 1578 a vast labyrinth of underground cemeteries were rediscovered and believed by the church to contain early Christian martyrs.
Most were decorated by nuns in Rome
Here is an extract from the Empire of death;
"To understand the great charnel houses we must first acknowledge that death itself is not a fixed concept. The French sociologist Jean Baudrillard, one of the greatest cultural theorists of the modern era, defined death as being simply the line of demarcation that separates the dead from the living. Within that axiomatic statement is an important implication: the line can be fluid. The process of living inevitably brings the cessation of life, but death as a concept is an intellectual construction that can vary from society to society and era to era."
EVALUATION
I think I touched on some interesting topics such as death in pop culture and the media, it was a bit hard to seamlessly go from that transition to the charnel houses etc. and this showed in the presentation, it didn't go as well as it could've for these reasons. next time I will make a presentation that's more inter connected and flows easily.
