Japan’s obsession with camera-equipped mobile phones has taken a bizarre twist, with mourners at funerals now using the devices to capture a final picture of the deceased.
At one ceremony several people gathered round the coffin and took out their phones to photograph the corpse as preparations were made to begin a cremation, she was quoted as saying.
“I’m sure the deceased would never want their faces photographed,” she said.
But others called it a form of a memento in the modern age.
No comment.
so I’m thinking… if you didn’t get the picture of them while they were alive… did you really care enough about them that you ought get the picture after death?
Reminds me of the 19th-century practice of “post-mortem” or “coffin” portraiture.
http://www.ancestry.com/learn/library/article.aspx?article=151
“Photography was a very popular pastime in Victorian America and, according to author Maureen Delorme, “postmortem photography of the deceased, especially of children, was a virtual obsession to nineteenth century Americans.” Bereaved families wanting to keep a memory of a lost child would have a photo made of the child lying in its coffin.”
Or:
http://vv.arts.ucla.edu/terminals/meinwald/meinwald1.html
“In the twentieth century, the prevailing method of dealing with permanent separation is to put it out of mind. In the nineteenth century, the tendency was to keep it in mind, to retain the presence of the deceased person in any way possible. Visual images, especially photographs, provided some of the most effective and emotionally satisfying means of doing so.”
I remember being startled by a picture-filled book – stumbled-upon in a book store, years ago – documenting America’s previous embrace of memorial photos of the dead.
Especially disturbing were the pictures of people who had died after a long illness. I can’t imagine keeping any of them on my living room wall – but they did.
Considering Japan’s demographics, and its now officially-shrinking population, why not let the Nipponese learn to have a little fun and entertainment at funerals? They’ll certainly be going to a lot of them.
Maybe they are trying to catch some winning lottery numbers on film…
I know a pro portrait photographer who has done a few post-mortum photos…even recently