Memento Mori
Memoria 2023
Today is the first day of Fall in the Northern Hemisphere, and the seasons are visibly (and in other ways) shifting. From my own perspective, within my own Way, this marks the unofficial beginning of Memoria; a festival of harvest and remembrance before the onset of the winter months. That festival will “officially” begin when … Read moreMemoria 2023
VR Near-Death Simulation and Memento Mori Rituals (New York City, September 2023)
On the afternoon of September 17th, nine participants gathered in the Morbid Anatomy Library in Brooklyn, NYC to undertake an experiment in ritual space and time, guided by artists Bridget Carey, Tony Wolf and Virgil Wong. The main gates of Green-Wood Cemetery, just a few minutes’ walk from the Morbid Anatomy Library. Note the large … Read moreVR Near-Death Simulation and Memento Mori Rituals (New York City, September 2023)
The Elegy Project
Co-founded by Karen Elizabeth Bishop and David Sherman, The Elegy Project: The Project also includes a curriculum of courses on Modern Elegy, Ode and Elegy and Inventing Farewell: A Practicum on Elegy.
Starting Point: a new, memento mori-themed online course
Humanist chaplain and creator of the Adventures of Memento Mori podcast D.S. Moss has created a comprehensive new online course for people seeking to “learn to live by remembering to die”: Culture may put us in boxes, but that doesn’t mean we have to stay there. Life – the fact that we’re living, breathing, thinking, … Read moreStarting Point: a new, memento mori-themed online course
Day of the Dead Art at the National Museum of Mexican Art (2022)
As part of my annual Memoria activity during late October and early November, I enjoy attending the Día de Muertos exhibition, staged each year by the National Museum of Mexican Art in Pilsen. Here’s a gallery of some of the 2022 displays:
“Death and Disobedience in Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio”
Megan Baffoe writes for The Order of the Good Death on the themes of mortality and disobedience in director Guillermo del Toro’s recent movie: The spirit explains her philosophy of death – that, all in all, ‘the one thing that makes human life precious and meaningful … is how brief it is.’ I’ve of course … Read more“Death and Disobedience in Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio”
“Befriend the Reaper”
In this episode of the Imaginary Worlds podcast, host Eric Molinsky and his guests ponder various personifications of Death in fantasy fiction: Sometimes Death is portrayed as a Grim Reaper, but Death doesn’t have to be grim. Death can be compassionate, and even funny. And more often in recent years, Death has been depicted as … Read more“Befriend the Reaper”