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Seeing death : portraiture in contemporary postmortem photography
This thesis focuses on the aesthetics of the photographic representation of the actual dead body in Elizabeth Heyert's The Travelers (2004), Pieter Hugo's The Bereaved (2005) and Walter Schels and Beate Lakotta's Life Before Death: Portraits of the Dying (2004). The use of portraiture in each of the...
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English |
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Michaelis School of Fine Art
2015
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| _version_ | 1867613216366919680 |
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| access_status_str | Open Access |
| author | Higgins, Josephine |
| author2 | Richards, Colin |
| author_browse | Higgins, Josephine Richards, Colin |
| author_facet | Richards, Colin Higgins, Josephine |
| author_sort | Higgins, Josephine |
| collection | Thesis |
| description | This thesis focuses on the aesthetics of the photographic representation of the actual dead body in Elizabeth Heyert's The Travelers (2004), Pieter Hugo's The Bereaved (2005) and Walter Schels and Beate Lakotta's Life Before Death: Portraits of the Dying (2004). The use of portraiture in each of these artist's series is crucial as it suggests an interest in the 'subjectness' of the corpse. Katarzyna Majak's (2011) theory of socialization as an attempt to lessen the scandal of the corpse through representation is central throughout this thesis. Majak argues that for the viewer the corpse is a scandal, because it discomfortingly presents the transformation of a body from subject to object. For Majak, socialization is essentially the taming of the dead body, achieved by re-presenting the corpse as an individual. Socialization emphasizes the subject-ness of the deceased individual, rather than the object-ness of the corpse, of pure unadulterated matter. The use of portraiture in each of the above series socializes the corpse by presenting the individual identity of the deceased as a subject, in varying degrees. Death is approached through the recognizable conventions of portraiture itself, thereby to some extent taming or domesticating the corpse. This thesis expands on Majak's valuable theory by establishing a continuum of socialization from subject-ness to object-ness. Importantly, this continuum reveals varying degrees of socialization within the three series. Socialization is used here as an analytical tool with which to explore the photographs, drawing out similarities and differences. I argue that through various aesthetic techniques, these three series encourage the viewer to look at these different images of the corpse with varying degrees of comfort. |
| format | Thesis |
| id | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/14152 |
| institution | University of Cape Town (South Africa) |
| language | eng |
| last_indexed | 2026-06-10T12:32:37.404Z |
| license_str | Not specified — see source repository |
| provenance_str_mv | Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| publishDate | 2015 |
| publishDateRange | 2015 |
| publishDateSort | 2015 |
| publisher | Michaelis School of Fine Art |
| publisherStr | Michaelis School of Fine Art |
| record_format | dspace |
| source_str | UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| spelling | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/14152 Seeing death : portraiture in contemporary postmortem photography Higgins, Josephine Richards, Colin Josephy, Svea Fine Art This thesis focuses on the aesthetics of the photographic representation of the actual dead body in Elizabeth Heyert's The Travelers (2004), Pieter Hugo's The Bereaved (2005) and Walter Schels and Beate Lakotta's Life Before Death: Portraits of the Dying (2004). The use of portraiture in each of these artist's series is crucial as it suggests an interest in the 'subjectness' of the corpse. Katarzyna Majak's (2011) theory of socialization as an attempt to lessen the scandal of the corpse through representation is central throughout this thesis. Majak argues that for the viewer the corpse is a scandal, because it discomfortingly presents the transformation of a body from subject to object. For Majak, socialization is essentially the taming of the dead body, achieved by re-presenting the corpse as an individual. Socialization emphasizes the subject-ness of the deceased individual, rather than the object-ness of the corpse, of pure unadulterated matter. The use of portraiture in each of the above series socializes the corpse by presenting the individual identity of the deceased as a subject, in varying degrees. Death is approached through the recognizable conventions of portraiture itself, thereby to some extent taming or domesticating the corpse. This thesis expands on Majak's valuable theory by establishing a continuum of socialization from subject-ness to object-ness. Importantly, this continuum reveals varying degrees of socialization within the three series. Socialization is used here as an analytical tool with which to explore the photographs, drawing out similarities and differences. I argue that through various aesthetic techniques, these three series encourage the viewer to look at these different images of the corpse with varying degrees of comfort. 2015-10-06T14:17:26Z 2015-10-06T14:17:26Z 2013 Master Thesis Masters MFA http://hdl.handle.net/11427/14152 eng application/pdf Michaelis School of Fine Art Faculty of Humanities University of Cape Town |
| spellingShingle | Fine Art Higgins, Josephine Seeing death : portraiture in contemporary postmortem photography |
| thesis_degree_str | Master's |
| title | Seeing death : portraiture in contemporary postmortem photography |
| title_full | Seeing death : portraiture in contemporary postmortem photography |
| title_fullStr | Seeing death : portraiture in contemporary postmortem photography |
| title_full_unstemmed | Seeing death : portraiture in contemporary postmortem photography |
| title_short | Seeing death : portraiture in contemporary postmortem photography |
| title_sort | seeing death portraiture in contemporary postmortem photography |
| topic | Fine Art |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/11427/14152 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT higginsjosephine seeingdeathportraitureincontemporarypostmortemphotography |