What was the thought behind taking photos of deceased relatives?

Look up ‘memento mori” photography, very popular in the Victorian era, often the only photos people had of their loved ones. there are volumes and volumes of photos online from this era. It is also popular now for parents to take photos and videos of their still born infants, new PC label of “born still.” Tons of videos of both these practices on youtube.

Not the way I want to remember my mother, dead one year ago, tonight.

@marinelife I agree, and..I’m sorry, Anniversary dates can suck.

@Coloma I am trying not to make it into an anniversary, but I sure was aware of it this year. Tomorrow is my sister’s birthday. We lost her several years ago, and I am now in a place to celebrate her life not remember her death. I am hoping I will get there with my Mom eventually.

I was reading about this, and back in those days photographs were very expensive, so not many people afforded them. Sometimes a photo after death was the only picture they’d ever be able to have of a loved one.

I was about to make a similar post to @snowberry.‘s However, I was going to say that the invention of photography equipment meant people could capture the image of their loved one, even if they couldn’t afford lots of photos throughout their life. If you look for post-mortem photography there are whole archives of these types of photographs. Here’s another archive with information about this activity.

I just think people were morbid back then.

@ucme People of that era were not any more or less morbid than in any other time, before or since. In the present era of Instagram it can be difficult to remember that through most of recorded history access to images of any type was extremely limited, mostly reserved for wealthy and/or powerful.

Still think they were.

@ucme More morbid than us with our present obsession of all things dead and “undead”, vampires, etc.? Naw, I don’t think so. They were simply practical.

“I couldn’t afford a picture of them when they were alive, but if I don’t get one now that they’re dead, I’ll never ever have one. ” So they made them up to look as natural as possible and got the picture. It seems the morticians and photographers worked hand in hand, or possibly had the same skills and offered similar services.

What @Coloma said. They even had special furniture that they could prop the people up in/with.

We have in the next auction – and was mentioned on NPR today – an even odder practice to me: Sentimental Hairwork as a way of remembering the deceased.

Yes

Thank you all for the answers posted so far.

@Coloma Thanks for introducing me to the term of “memento mori”. It made for an interesting read that answered the question.

@marinelife As soon as I read your first response, I flagged my question and asked that it be moved to ‘Social’. Thank you for sharing. When Dad died, I started personally celebrating him by asking a friend or two out for a drink on his birthday instead of the anniversary of his death. They didn’t know the reason behind it. We just enjoyed each other’s company while I sipped on Dad’s favorite cocktail and gave him a private toast.

@snowberry That makes sense. A trendy twist on ‘memento mori’

@Earthbound_Misfit Thank you for the links. The family Bible was purchased in the late 1800’s that was published the year my grandmother was born. Her father was a doctor, so maybe he was privy to the means and modes of capturing these images.

@ucme That was my first thought. When I mentioned the Bible to a cousin, she immediately asked if it was the one with the creepy photos of dead people at the back of it.

@ibstubro I’ve heard of this practice before. While just as morbid, it seems more sentimental.

@Pied_Pfeffer Thanks. That’s a good tradition.