3.10.2010

David Maisel

Design Observer is my current homepage. I read Adam Harrison Levy's essay Deaths Bloom this morning and found myself unable to look away from the accompanying photography.

"From 1913 to 1971 five thousand one hundred and twenty one mentally ill patients were cremated on the grounds of the Oregon State Hospital. Their remains were sealed in copper canisters. The canisters were stored in the hospital’s basement until the 1970s when they were moved to a memorial vault underground. The vault was subjected to periodic floods. In 2000 they were removed from their institutional crypt, placed on plain pine shelves in a storeroom, and were left virtually forgotten until David Masiel heard of their existence and photographed them..."

Please go read the article. Look at the images. The exhibition catalog, Library of Dust, is officially on my wish list. These images are ephemeral and beautiful.


via Design Observer



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