The Gentle Art of Disappearing, or creating creating memorials postmortem
DESIGN: Ewelina Kaczmarska
Poland
make me! 2022
The Gentle Art of Disappearing, or creating memorials postmortem” is a tribute to the water cremation process, which is one of the most ecological ways to say goodbye to the body. The remains of the process are ground into snow-white dust from which memorials are made. I wanted to make us realize that the changes in traditions and the availability of new technologies related to the burial are almost at your fingertips. The only obstacles are the legal system and the tendency to maintain the status quo. The memorials visible in the photos are in the form of river stones, but they are distinguished by the fact that they slowly, around a year, dissolve in water (or ’cause of an air erosion). The mold for the casting of the memorial can be created on using any stone with a rather easy shape. The process was designed to emphasize that each memorial has very similar shape and features, but differs in the amount of the starting material – calcium phosphate. The addition of Portland cement was used to join the phosphate particles. The slow leaching of calcium phosphate particles is to allow you to gradually get used to the fact that what is irreversible is progressing and it’s high time to say goodbye.
The target space for memorials may be a place chosen by a loved once. It can be an institutionalized place, for example a memorial park or a space that is an emotional representation for the deceased and their relatives, the space that they are attached to. The location of the memorial in the watercourse lets it dissolve gradually. That emphasise a symbolic return the deceased present only in our memories to the nature.
The Gentle Art of Disappearing, or creating creating memorials postmortem, design: Ewelina Kaczmarska / from designer’s archive
The Gentle Art of Disappearing, or creating creating memorials postmortem, design: Ewelina Kaczmarska / from designer’s archive
The Gentle Art of Disappearing, or creating creating memorials postmortem, design: Ewelina Kaczmarska / from designer’s archive
The Gentle Art of Disappearing, or creating creating memorials postmortem, design: Ewelina Kaczmarska / from designer’s archive
EWELINA KACZMARSKA
Ewelina is a graduate of Wojciech Gerson’s Artistic High School in Warsaw – Interior Design specialization, the Design Faculty at Fine Arts Academy in Warsaw (bachelor of art since march 2022) and at the Hochschule für Gestaltung Schwäbisch Gmünd as a participant of the Erasmus program. In 2019 she with her colleagues have established a coop design studio “TAKŁADNIE” which now counts up to 20 individual designers.
She is curious about the everyday life of ordinary people. She perceives human dysfunction as one of the most important reasons to design. In human habits and traditional thinking, she respects the desire not to force an open door, but wishes that users and designers to leave the comfort zone more often. Her recent mission: co-creating a culture open to talk about death and sadness straightforwardly.
