Taphophile: Ledgers of the Dead

‘Ledgers of the Dead’ is a photographic account of the lands of the dead.

No matter where I venture, I always stumble upon a cemetery, burial ground, graveyard, necropolis or hidden gateway to the underworld. To me there is no more powerful form of accounting than the recording of a life once lived, a memory and lifetime etched in stone. Accounted for and keeping the balance of life and death in society.

The photos featured are unedited. While reviewing the images, thought turned to the concern that they lacked ‘polish’ (dare I even say amateur, mostly due do my not being a professional photographer) but, on further reflection, the decision was made to leave them in their ‘raw’ condition.

Death is raw. Death is uncontrollable, at times we can manage aspects of it, but largely we can never fully control it. It is imperfect, like these images. Death is the end of a process, a moment in time, at death everything stops for the mortal recipient and so too will the moment the camera captured this moment stop the process of the recording of image.

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