Med døden i lommen

Abstract

Death on the Internet has received much attention from the world of research, where focus has largely been on private memorial sites and the use of social network sites like Facebook for commemoration. In a more private sphere, however, the pictures of the deceased that never leave the smartphone with which they were taken have not attracted the same attention from researchers. This article addresses the private uses of smartphone photographs taken of relatives after they have died. Deathbed photography - or post mortem photography, as it has also come to be known - has been practiced since the birth of photography. The forms and aesthetics have changed alongside the development of photographic techniques; but what has happened to the deathbed photograph in the era of the smartphone, when every smartphone poses the possibility of documenting and sharing our private experiences of bereavement? With this preliminary study, I will address the questions of production and usage of deathbed photographs as a contemporary practice which, however often kept hidden, appears to be more widespread than first anticipated.

Keywords

• death
• photography
• mourning
• digital
• smartphone