Photographing death with irony

Hi everyone, I'm doing a PhD in Australia on irony and death in photography and I'm trying to place when irony was first used intentionally by an author/photographer in the depiction of death, real or pretend, does anyone have any ideas? Jay Ruby's book 'Secure the Shadow' has a self-portrait of Sarah Bernhardt in a coffin where she is parodying mortuary/funerary photographs and that was taken in the 1870s, but if anyone has come across anything from around that time I'd be soooo appreciative. Cheers - Emma

sarahbernhardt004.jpg

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  • cheers steve i had downlaoded the pdf a while ago and, while looking at it, thought i'd check this site again and realised i'd not responded to thank you. super interesting exhibition - the ying and the yang of photography. Thanks its a great historical context resource - i'm not sure if its the photographer or the child in me that likes that it has pictures ^_^ 

    thanks


    Steve Moriarty Curator of photography at the Snite Museum, University of Notre Dame said:

    Emma:  You might be interested in a catalog of an exhibit I did when i was the curator of photography at the Snite Museum of Art at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana.  There is a PDF on the museum's web site, the catalog is "Darkness and Light: Death and Beauty in Photography."

     

    Steve Moriarty

    Curator Emeritus

  • no motion media - irony is already such a big field and so different from motion media that i'd probably end up overcomplicating it, as it is i'm broadening out the research to photographic irony in general because there is so little published about it. sorry abut the tardy response i thought i'd replied but obviously not ^_^ thanks for the interest i'll keep you posted



    Afzal Ansary said:

    Interesting - does your research restrict itself to still images or extends to motion media as well?
  • Emma:  You might be interested in a catalog of an exhibit I did when i was the curator of photography at the Snite Museum of Art at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana.  There is a PDF on the museum's web site, the catalog is "Darkness and Light: Death and Beauty in Photography."

     

    Steve Moriarty

    Curator Emeritus

  • Interesting - does your research restrict itself to still images or extends to motion media as well?
  • thanks david, that is defintiely of interest to the doctorate in general. Photography and death have such a "history" both as an industry and theory of photography, ironic or not, its all of significance and interest!

    cheers



    David G Präkel said:

    You might wish to have a look at Audrey Linkman's soon-to-be-released book Photography and Death (to which I contributed a very small piece of information concerning the use of Polaroid materials) - Reaktion Books 978-1861897916. Irony is not Audrey's 'take' as she considerers natural death within the family but I'm sure you'll find her writing thought provoking.
  • you rock mark - that's excellent

    ps yes as you can tell by the ongoing open thread the doctorate is not yet finished *_*

    thanks it looks like an interesting coffee table book :)

    Mark Jacobs said:

    Emma, I see this thread is still active. Back in April of last year I mentioned a book of images of medical school students being photographed while clowning around with cadavers and skeletons. I remembered the title:

    Dissection: Photographs of a Rite of Passage in American Medicine 1880-1930 by John Harley Warner

    http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/0922233349/ref=dp_olp_used?i...

     

  • Emma, I see this thread is still active. Back in April of last year I mentioned a book of images of medical school students being photographed while clowning around with cadavers and skeletons. I remembered the title:

    Dissection: Photographs of a Rite of Passage in American Medicine 1880-1930 by John Harley Warner

    http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/0922233349/ref=dp_olp_used?i...

     

  • cheers that's great i'll check it out 

    Piers Rawson said:

    http://www.qcp.org.au/artists/queensland/album-233/59

     

    Dr Stephen Hobson (Australia based) has written eloquently on topics surrounding this; There are important visual contributions from Mexican photographer Pedro Meyer and many others on the  website http://www.zonezero.com (search "death")

  • http://www.qcp.org.au/artists/queensland/album-233/59

     

    Dr Stephen Hobson (Australia based) has written eloquently on topics surrounding this; There are important visual contributions from Mexican photographer Pedro Meyer and many others on the  website http://www.zonezero.com (search "death")

  • That's great again Mark - Cheers! thanks for the pics too, the burns archive website doesn't have a great deal. Really funky images in terms of performance and play for the camera. Do you think its in the book that was done with Joel-Peter Witkin, it sounds like his bag? I'll order all of the books with burns archive pics into the library anyway (the library will have the most fantastic skitz) and i'll keep you posted as to what is in what if you like.
    Any ideas regarding whether or not the Bayard hissy-fit pic was the first photograph to use irony in general, despite death as the locating metaphor/theme? either way, it all proves quite interesting in terms of the contextual history of what I'm looking at. Interestingly for me as a side bit, i think Hip's image says something about the assumption of photographic truth right from the get go, if he felt that on the back he had to sign his own death notice so the irony and 'fakeness' in the image would be understood.
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