ArtStorming the Art of Remembrance: Joanna Ebenstein

Most of us are taught to treat death like a distant problem for “someday” and then we wonder why it feels so terrifying when it finally shows up. I’m joined by Joanna Ebenstein, the founder of Morbid Anatomy, to challenge that reflex and to reclaim death as a subject that can be met with dignity, curiosity, and even beauty.

Joanna Ebenstein:

https://www.morbidanatomy.org

https://www.morbidanatomy.org/grand-tour-archive/p/muerte-en-mexico-san-luis-potosi

https://www.morbidanatomy.org/books/p/signed-pre-order-memento-mori-the-art-of-contemplating-death-to-live-a-better-life

https://www.morbidanatomy.org/books/p/death-a-graveside-companion-signed-by-editor-joanna-ebenstein-and-contributor-laetitia-barbier

https://muttermuseum.org

@morbidanatomy

@joanna.ebenstein

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Music for ArtStorming was written and performed by John Cruikshank.

Transcript

Big Questions About Creative Lives

Speaker 7 0:00

Have you ever wondered what makes creative people tick? Where do their ideas come from? What keeps them energized? What kinds of things get in their way? Is their life really as much fun as it looks from the outside? Hello, I'm your host Lili Pierpont, and this is Art Storming, a podcast about how ideas become paintings or poems, performances or collections. Each episode, I'll chat with a guest from the arts community and we'll explore how the most creative among us stare down a blank canvas or reach into the void and create something new. In our inaugural season, art Storming the City Different, we dipped our toes into the vast ocean of creativity with a focus on some of our favorite creators of Santa Fe, New Mexico. That conversation was enjoyed by artists and non-artists alike because it showed us how we can all benefit from learning how to generate something from nothing. Dream bigger, charter, new territories, and solve problems in new ways. In season two, we're gonna take that concept of generating our lives with intention to the next level. This season, we're talking about legacy art as legacy, and how the most creative among us tackle this rich and deeply personal subject. Welcome to Art Storming, the Art of Remembrance.

Speaker 5 1:20

Most people spend their entire lives sprinting away from the one thing that's guaranteed to catch them, the end. We've sanitized it, we've professionalized it, we've tucked death away in sterile hospital wings and hidden it behind the closed doors of funeral homes, hoping that if we don't look at it, it won't look back at us. But my guest today argues that by hiding from death, we've actually lost our grip on life. Joanna Ebenstein is the founder of

Lili 1:46

Morbid Anatomy,

Speaker 5 1:48

and she doesn't see the macabre as something to be feared. To her, a Victorian locket made of human hair or a wax medical model isn't creepy. It's a masterpiece of the human experience. Today, Joanna joins me from Mexico, complete with barking dogs and squawking birds, to talk about why we became a culture of death deniers and how she's fighting to bring dignity back to the bone.

Meet Joanna Ebenstein In Mexico

Lili 2:12

Great. So welcome Joanna. And, uh, you're in Brooklyn, right?

Joanna 2:17

I'm actually in Mexico right now. I live part-time and married on Mexico, which is where I am at this moment.

Lili 2:22

Oh, fantastic.

Joanna 2:23

Yeah,

Lili 2:24

Okay. Well, so then I wasn't gonna talk about the weather in New York, which I just checked.

Joanna 2:30

I can tell you it's hot here. That's always pretty much how it is.

Lili 2:34

Yeah, that's a part of the world I haven't been to yet, but it's on my list.

Joanna 2:39

Okay. Mexico in general or Marita.

Lili 2:41

I've been to parts of Mexico, but Marita, I haven't. And I hear it's wonderful. So are you're a part-time expat.

Joanna 2:47

Yes. I Or immigrant as I think it's fairer to say.

Lili 2:51

Oh, very good. Very good. I've been really looking forward to this conversation because I'm just so curious about, everything that you do. I deviated from my norm, which is usually to go into a, conversation like this pretty cold as if we're meeting for the first time. And so that everything I'm learning about you, I'm learning about in real time, but I had to sneak a peek, because. Just everything you're up to is so interesting and I'm in addition to being an author multiple times over. You've got the Morbid Academy, which I can't wait to hear more about, and the museum and I lived in Philadelphia for a little while, so I just wanna say that I'm familiar with the Mutter Museum.

Joanna 3:29

that was a big inspiration to me. Yeah.

Lili 3:31

Yeah. So, we're just gonna jump right in and I wanna hear everything just from the beginning. First of all, how on earth did you get interested in all of this in the first place?

Childhood Curiosity And Family History

Lili 3:41

I.

Joanna 3:41

Yeah, I mean, that's a question I get asked a lot and I don't have an easy answer. my, my pat answers, I think all children are interested in this and I, for whatever reason, just didn't outgrow it. I had the support of parents who, nurtured my weird interests. I was a geeky, sciencey kid. I liked playing at the pond. I liked catching animals. and freeing them. I should hasten the ad. I loved animals. and the other thing that I always. I think is important to add is my grandparents, who I was very close with were Holocaust survivors. So I think death was present in my family in a way that growing up in suburban California was not in most of my peers. So even when I was a little kid, I remember looking around and just thinking everyone's gonna die. We don't talk about it. Even as a little kid. I was thinking that. So I think there was something, because my lived experience was so different Then how culture was going. That, that made me a little bit different and made me not fit in, I might say. so I was always interested in it, but what led to the actual Morbid Anatomy project if I backtracked Philadelphia, someone gifted me, calendars based on the mood museum, beautiful photographs of the objects, and someone gave me one. When I was just out of college, I think as a gift because they knew I liked this sort of weird stuff and I was just mesmerized. I was actually born in Philadelphia. We went back for my grandmother's funeral and I said, I have to go to this museum. So I went and. And my mind was blown, mind is the wrong word. There was something, as you know, having gone there, right? That's so powerful, of an experience when you're standing before preserved human remains, or these models that depict, the human body. And I just became intrigued and then. I found a book much later when I was around, oh, I even know, 30 something, called Stuffed Animals in Pickled Heads by a scholar called Steven Asma. He's a philosopher and it's a history of natural history museums, and it talks about these medical museums and these comparative anatomy museums all around Europe. I decided to go photograph some. I was a photographer at the time, and I went and spent a couple weeks traveling through France and England came back, happened to meet a medical museum curator who was intrigued by this project. I got a small stipend and I went back for a proper one month long pilgrimage for Europe to the great medical museums of the western world. And at that time, they weren't very popular. I had reached out to the curators ahead of time, so everyone was expecting me and everyone was Lovely and generous and encouraging of my interest and gave me books to read and articles to read, and I considered it my unofficial graduate degree. And I came back and I just had so much information and all these incredible images and how to turn thousands of images into a very small exhibition I didn't really know how to do. And I started this blog called Morbid Anatomy, and it was really just a tool to start to organize all of the materials that I was using. To create a blog that I wish had existed. So one that took this material not in like a gothy or heavy metal, isn't this cool way, but a scholarly yet accessible way in a way, I would say, and I was a graphic designer at the time as well, the design, I wanted it to feel like the Mood museum, because I think the Mood Museum just such a fantastic job of framing those objects and letting you take what you wish from them. Not saying, oh my God, look at this crazy

The Mutter Museum Spark

Joanna 6:55

thing. But that kind of. dignified Victorian Frame creates a space where you can have your own experience, and I wanted to do something like that. So I tried to keep a restrained palette, keep it simple, keep it elegant, and allow people to see what they saw in those things and present them. As the beautiful and historical objects, I thought they were not as these gross, weird things. So that was really the birth of more of an anatomy. To my utter surprise, it started to develop a following almost within the first day I did it. this was the way the blogs worked Back then. I didn't know. I just thought it was a cool tool. But everyone I linked to started to email me. And then even within a few days, a medical historian that I did a lot of work with, Mike Spel sent me an email and said, is this yours? I didn't use my real name at the time because I was a graphic designer for children's publishing, including Scholastic, and I just thought, if they find out I'm into this is it. but he, I used my initials and so I was. It just had a life of its own. It's always had a life of its own. And so from there, I had a bibliography on the blog and people began to ask if they could access those books. And these books are not easily found in the us, not even in academic libraries, I bought them from my own research. So I started to open my home, and this is like impossible now, but in New York City, I found a really teeny, tiny, affordable space that I could. Create a open to the public library. People started to come First it was by appointment, then it was weekends, then I had docents. Then we expanded into a space next door and started doing events there. Then I met a woman called Tracy Hurley Martin, who came to the library right when we were starting to outgrow it and said, this should be something bigger. And she and I teamed up to create the Morbid Anatomy Museum, which unfortunately now no longer exists. So we went. yeah, I'm sorry to say, in 2016, we closed our doors, but the good news is we do have an open to the public space, much more modest in Brooklyn and is in a place called Industry City. So there still is a way to visit Morbid Anatomy. It's not a three floor, grand, epic experience anymore, but we have a lot of artifacts from around the world and a research collection of books. All of those books plus some, and you can come spend the day and do research, take pictures. Um, once we closed the museum, we went largely online. And this was also, around the time of COVID, right? So first we started a website, and then when COVID started. As my then colleague Leticia Barbier said, what we were interested in went from being, marginal, or a special interest in death to being something a lot more people were interested. In all of a sudden because suddenly we are being confronted with it and we offer, I like to think tools for helping people. Make friends with and become less afraid of death. So we started doing online classes. She and I started teaching. We started to invite some friends and now that's one of the biggest things we do. So we have an online morbid Academy, as you said, which is a series of classes by teachers around the world, with students around the world. We also do trips, so we have an upcoming trip. We just announced to Mexico for Day of the Dead to Sun Louis Potosi, which is where Leonor Carrington lived. So really excited about that. And there's also a surrealist garden there by one of her benefactors. So it's gonna be surrealism and Day of the dead this year. And you can find out all of this on our website, morbid anatomy.org.

Lili 10:06

Oh my God, I wanna come on

Joanna 10:07

Come. I mean you should, and it's a great group of people. Always like the people. Often it sells out even before we announce it because people, our guide, Sal, is so amazing and puts together such wonderful trips. And so his name is Salvador Gin. And his background, I met him in New York City when he was studying at SVA, his research project. Which makes it so perfect for what we do was to look at the history of depictions of death in Mexico and tie them into where we are in contemporary art, but looking at that whole history and he is brilliant and wonderful and lovely.

Lili 10:40

So the dates coincide with Day of the Dead? So is it November, early November.

Joanna 10:44

Yes. Yeah, so that's actually the way that I ended up in Mexico is because of sells trips. That's how I fell in love with Mexico, and we came to Meida once. That's how I know about Meida. yes, we do one every year pretty much when, it's safe to do so.

Lili 10:56

Oh, that's so cool. Well, you know, are you familiar with Greenwood Cemetery?

Joanna 11:02

of course, we had a residency there for a number of years. They opened their doors to us very kindly.

Lili 11:07

That's cool. Well, I just dropped the, episode with Harry Weill yes. Last, last week. And,

Joanna 11:13

Oh, hair is the

Lili 11:14

yeah, we did a great episode and my family was actually instrumental in starting Greenwood Cemetery, so I, it, it's a history that I go way back, but he spoke a lot about their day of the dead ritual that they do and I was just so intrigued with that and you've said so many things that I wanna kind of piggyback on, but, one thing I'm curious about is in the Victorian era we were so much more out about death and discussions of death and dying. And it's so funny 'cause when we usually think of the term as becoming Victorian, as becoming very buttoned up and uptight, but when it comes to death, the Victorians were way more like open about that. What do you think shifted the conversation from the Victorian era to how we view it

From Blog To Museum To Academy

Lili 11:53

now?

Joanna 11:53

That's, that's a really great question. I think a really pivotal question too. I think a number of things happened from the late 19th century into the early 20th century. First of all, there's germ theory, right? For the first time we have a theory about germs and the idea of hygiene in that way the dead body starts to be seen as something maybe that might be dangerous. we also have. The early 20th century, this confluence of, on the one hand, world War I and on the other, the influenza epidemic. And so what I've seen said by a lot of, historians is that the numbers of the dead were so great. On top of that, women were having to join the workforce to make up for the missing men that the old ways just couldn't go on. you know, to, to talk to your listeners who might not know about Victorian death, right? Women could be in mourning for over a year wearing different kind of. Colors at different times. They were also at home making these handcrafts, including hair, art., And I'll try to expound on that. We're actually acquiring collection of hair art in Morbid Anatomy, which I'm really excited about. and so you have all of these things going on. And then I think the other thing that I don't see written about as much, but that I'm starting to think was really important is, is religion is taking a backstage, right? So a lot of these. Death rituals are based on this idea of the continuation of the soul and this idea of staying in touch with the dead in a way, and I think as. We became modern as we moved into this era that starts to be seen as old fashioned, as questionable, as, superstitious, maybe even. it's just not where people are putting their energy anymore. and I think it starts to be seen as morbid as well. And Even in, in naming my project, morbid Anatomy, I was really interested in rethinking the idea of morbid. What is morbid and why is it morbid to think about death? Why would it be? And you know, I just got back from India, for example, and we stayed in a city called Varanasi. Varanasi is a city where people go to die in India, and I saw so many dead bodies. Every day if you walk by the Ganges, which is also a tourist area, right? You see people selling cotton candy, you see children running around and you see dead bodies burning 24 7. there's nothing, remarkable about it, And what was interesting is. My husband and I who both are interested in death. He's a death doula and a meditator. And then I do, of course, morbid anatomy. At first when we saw this, we would just sit there Andra, for hours and then by the end it became, for us just part of everyday life what I'm trying to get at here is, I think something happened with the professionalization of the dead body, so it moves outta the home. So for. Millennia people had cared for dead bodies in the home. Usually women of the family, they would clean the body and prepare it for viewing and people would come view it. That stops and it moves to a funeral parlor. And I think what happens at this point is the body itself, the dead body, which is the most natural, normal thing that humans have always. Been side by side with disappears. And I think when that happens, that's where that uptightness that you're referring to happens is that that has to do with fear. I think, because we've never seen it, many people have never seen a dead body. Now, if you think of all the humans that, that in our lives have died. How remarkable that is. And then also if you think of the fact that the elderly used to live at home in extended families, Death old age decrepitude was a part of everyday life in a way that I think is really hard for us to imagine now. And so I think it's become mystified and darkly mystified, I would say. And also. Not darkly mystified. I think our fascination with death comes from that too. that whole charge around death is because it's become something distant from us. I would say it's a luxury of this historical moment that we could even deny death because it's been our constant companion since ever. Right.

Lili 15:32

It's the dawn of time, literally, or the dawn of human time. Well, it's so. Interesting because the pendulum does seem to be swinging back. And you mentioned influenza, you know, uh, world War ii and since we had COVID there, does seem to be this swinging back of the pendulum and with the onset of, human composting and green burial and shrouds becoming an artistic expression and Willow bask. I mean, I've been learning

How We Became Death Deniers

Lili 15:55

so much about the new emerging trends on how we. Deal with and dispose of. And the fact that we even say deal with, as if it's a, a problem a disposal problem. It's like there's a dead body that needs to be disposed of. And bringing that back into our everyday lives, one of the things we're trying to do with this podcast and with this whole season is to normalize that and find the life giving force of it once again. So what do you think is the reason for that pendulum swing.

Joanna 16:24

I think COVID is part of it for sure. I'm a big proponent of the theories of Carl Young, and one thing that he says that I think is really important and interesting is that, Artists, and by artists he meant all sorts of creatives and even people who are living a creative life, not necessarily creative practice, are instinctively drawn to the shadow side of a culture. And so the shadow side of a culture from his perspective, is that part of life which has been denied, and marginalized and outcast from our conscious awareness and. The way he saw it is that artists are instinctively trying to bring balance back into the collective consciousness. it's a reality of life. It's that there has to be a balance there. And I think we'd gone so far the other direction that there has to be some, children or young people who were, Re rebelling against their parents' way of looking at things or trying to find a new way are naturally going to find this and say, what the heck? And then also, I think there's an element too, what I feel when I speak to young people and they're, I'm so happy that these younger people are, working on legislation or trying to get real changes made in the world. And I feel like when I've spoken to a lot of them, they're just not gonna tolerate. Dying the way that it's been presented. Why should we die that way? Why should we be limited in this way? And, why should we turn this natural event into a horror, a frightful horror? And I agree with that. I think very sad, you know, I think what you're doing is great. Any way of putting out to people who haven't thought about it, that there are other ways of thinking about death and what we're given in our, dominant culture is so valuable because, if we look at the historical record, which has really been the way that I've entered this material, we can see that there are so many different ways that people have looked at death in the dead body over time and even opening our mind to the fact that there are those ways somehow I think. makes us at least question our own received wisdom of what is good and what is okay and what is normal actually. And so I think it, it had to happen. You know, I feel like sex and death are those two polls and if you look at the Victorians, sex was where they were oppressed. And then you have this whole backlash to that with Freud and then the 20th century obsession with sex, right? So I think there, there is a pendulum effect and I think sex and death. Are particularly, susceptible to being, cast out or demonized in this way because they link us to our animal nature in a way that's uncomfortable for a lot of people who wanna think of us as different and purely rational. There's nothing rational about sex or death, you know, and the rational mind can only go so far with it. So I I guess I would say I, I think it's a natural cycle that it's being re excavated and representeded and I'm, very personally glad. I'm sure you are too, because of course, don't we all want a death doula when we die? Don't we all want to like, not have to. Be afraid of death. think of how many people have died in the last hundred years that were afraid in a way that I don't think our ancestors were because they had rituals and, discourse around it, to talk about it. you know what I mean?

Lili 19:32

and what I love about what you're saying and how it ties in so much to what we're trying to do is that certainly because my focus has been. On talking to creatives, and I consider you in that category for sure. We're gonna get into that in just a minute. But, starting as early as, I don't know how much you've heard about, my personal history and how I got into this, but both of my parents were highly creative and they died, very prematurely. And there were no arrangements made around that because they weren't expecting to die. And consequently the, provisions that they had made for their exit it was such an afterthought. And my father, who was one of the most aesthetic human beings in the world ended up in a brown hermetically sealed box. Right? And so I, at the time, and one of the inspirations for this whole project was I had wished that we had, Artists or people standing by to create decorative objects that were suitable for their personalities That died cut to this whole series where I've been talking to creatives. I think this is our, over our 55th episode or something. And, you know, for creatives to go out without having. Considered their exit when they spend so much of their life devoted to curating, you know, so much of the expression of themselves. And then for them to just sort of go out into a gray tombstone or pile of ashes that is, such a afterthought. It's just so wrong. And so as I've been thinking about, why do we leave these decisions until the last minute? And what would be possible if we curated our death as much as we curated our life, and wouldn't it be a reason for celebration?

Why The Pendulum Swings Back

Lili 21:05

And in doing this exploration, there have been so many really interesting ways that I've learned that we can address this, that. As a creative person, I'm thinking like, that's it. There's no way I'm going back to the old ways. Or, the ways that have become, as you said, our conventional wisdom. I'm not sure there's some, a lot of wisdom in it. There seems to be a lot of, lack of consideration really.

Joanna 21:27

Yeah.

Lili 21:28

I just think that what you're doing is so amazing and I do wanna kind of segue to, you're also an artist, so I'd love you to talk about that.

Joanna 21:36

Yeah. it's, it's interesting. I've been thinking a lot about that lately. art is what took me here. I did study intellectual history and art in college, so I, I always had an, an academic or a scholarly, Interest as well. I love nonfiction, I love history. but when I moved to New York City, back in 1999, my goal was to go to art school. And my first year in New York, I took art classes and then I kind of lost steam with that and I kind of moved into photography too. I think part of being in New York City, it's a city that's so hard to find space, so it like you just move into what's easier. And also I think being new to New York City from California. many people I know move to New York and become artists of one sort or another because you're just trying to cope with so much diversity, so much information, so much visual stimulus. And, so morbid Anatomy started as a photo project. that's absolutely true. So I went to medical museums, I photographed them. But here's what happened. It was very interesting. When I showed that body of work at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, the curator I was working with was Stephanie Ruckus. She was the one who commissioned the show. Part of my fellowship obligation was to give a talk about, the project. And I watched people in the space looking at the art, and I did have captions, and then I watched them after I gave the talk and they looked at it in a totally different way. And I remember thinking to myself with, Disappointment actually. Like, oh, this doesn't work as an art project. Whatever it is, I'm trying to say, needs words and images. So images Alone did not communicate what I was hoping to communicate, which you can't really straightforwardly say what you're trying to communicate in an art project, but I was hoping that people would look at these. objects with a new appreciation and see them as beautiful and interesting and some things that could tell us about history rather than simply, macabre and grotesque things. That's how I saw them. I saw them as beautiful. and So then morbid anatomy also as a blog was words, images, and design, all of those things. So I began to reformulate what it is That my body of work is, and I realize that's really where I'm interested. You know, so I've done lots of image collection as a photographer and as a collector of images, a curator. I've also done a lot of curating in my life, and then writing and designing as well. And when all of those things work together, that's like my happiest place. And I think what I really. I began to realize is what I am ultimately as a communicator, and I will use whatever media is the right media to communicate those ideas. So this project, morbid Anatomy, has all been animated by My inquiry into trying to understand just what you were asking at the beginning of this conversation, how we got here, how we got to this place. So to backtrack, if I traced the roots of the Morbid Anatomy inquiry, I went to Europe for the first time right when I graduated college. And again, I had studied art and art history and history, and I went to these museums and these churches, one after the other, and I saw this imagery. that, combined death and beauty in ways that I had never seen before, not in any of my art history classes. We never talked about this stuff. it just blew my mind. And I began to collect those images and say, what's going on here? you know, my historian mind looked at them as data and said, okay, well there's so many of them that. They clearly weren't an aberration. It wasn't a few morbid people who were obsessed with death, like this was something that was normal, you can tell, and they weren't in, churches. They were in, institutional museums. These were not marginalized places. so what has happened to. Our culture that we no longer can even understand those images except thinking of them as morbid. And that really is the question that has animated so much of the morbid and anatomy enemy project and taken the form of first the blog, the exhibition, and then also a number of books as you said. So, I love books. I collect books. I have a library and I have been writing books for a long time. So So There's a few books that have gestured in this direction. I mean, the first was the anatomical Venus, So if you don't know the anatomical Venus, look her up right now. She's a Gort Preternaturally, beautiful life-sized wax woman. Dissectable, anatomically correct made in 18th century Italy to instruct a general public about human anatomy. And that object really became. An entry point to a rabbit hole that led me to just learn so much trying to understand how, a drive to understand and communicate the human body led to this utterly bizarre and to our eyes, sexualized object, There's a great quote by Nabokov, which is that an aesthetic inquiry often takes us into, researching an object. And I think that's very much for me, very true. So I'm surrounded by beautiful objects that have driven me to want to understand them. That's how I would say it. And I still consider myself, a creative person who's wanting to learn and understand and then communicate that in words and images when possible. if that makes sense. Yeah.

Lili 26:45

Totally. and I love that you're, presencing and elevating the idea of creativity, because that's, again, another thing. one of the things we're trying to do is demystify this idea of the continuum between an artist and a creative, It's so important that we inhabit our creative selves fully because of all of the self-expression that is possible from that space. But, are you familiar with an artist named Haida Hatchery?

Joanna 27:09

she's in our community. I, I, I know her personally. She's fantastic.

Lili 27:13

So she's our, actually our next, um, we're dropping her next. And, when you were talking about the wax figure and people don't know yet because I haven't, or I guess by the time you this episode airs, they will know about Haah hatchery, but when you were talking earlier about your family, history of, Holocaust survivors. And the work that she's doing around, depicting. People's portraits of the deceased first in caustic, which is a wax technique with the ashes. And

Art That Needs Words And Images

Lili 27:40

I was wondering if you had had some overlap with her.

Joanna 27:44

Yeah. It's a small world of like-minded people as, as I'm sure you've already found. You know, a lot of us already know each other.

Lili 27:50

Well, and they seem to coalesce around, Brooklyn as well because between Greenwood Cemetery and Haida. And then there's another photographer that you may know who I've been trying to get on this show, but I haven't been able to reach her. Alice Teel.

Joanna 28:02

I don't know

Lili 28:03

Oh, Look into Alice Teel. She does some very interesting photography around this subject. And then, conta Abate, who's a performer, and she does, musical eulogies and she's also based in Brooklyn. So Brooklyn has this concentration. I don't know what it is about Brooklyn.

Joanna 28:20

you know, it might be because of Greenwood and also Morbid Anatomy, you know, like So Morbid Anatomy does all these things, but I think overall it, it's a community, it's, creating resources. That allow a community to find one another. you know, there's a couple different projects going on that give people a way to find each other, which I think is so important to these sorts of schools. You know, artistic schools emerging is contact.

Lili 28:46

So you said at the beginning that, you even wanted to challenge the way we think of the word morbid. How do you think morbid anatomy has accomplished that or has it accomplished that?

Joanna 28:57

I think it has accomplished it for some people. for some people this is always gonna be gross and weird, and that's just a fact, And I'm sure you've encountered that in your own conversation. Sometimes you're, I've talked, for example, when we. Bought this house from, A couple. One of them was German, one was Mexican, and they'd never asked what I did for a living. And then after we'd signed the papers, they said, oh, what do you do for a living? And remember taking a deep breath and being like, oh, I'm not sure how they're gonna react to that. So people are, either very excited or they can be appalled. And these people were appalled. And I'm very lucky. To be now because of the morbid NME community and a self-selecting audience where I actually don't feel like this is weird at all anymore. Every once in a while I'm jarred by some sort of interaction in the real world. So this material's not for everybody, you have to be a certain kind of person. You have to, have an open mind of some sort and a certain kind of open mind, I should say. And, to some people who have not, for whatever reason. So taking a moment to question received wisdom, it just seems bizarre and strange and dark. what I would argue is it's not dark. I was invited to do a book after. Anatomical Venus, which ended up being called Death Graveside Companion, which is like an art history book of images of death through time and place. And I was lucky enough to work with the, now sadly, deceased Richard Harris on that. And he was a collector, collected I think over 3000 objects and artworks related to death. And he, it was amazing. Unfortunately, talking about legacy, he didn't. Figure out his legacy and it got divided by auction after he died. and he was someone who who was close to death. He was someone who was contemplating it, at least on some level. you know those people who wanna keep their legacy alive, you have to work on it now. You can't trust that it will be happening in your absence. The other book that I think has a lot to do with what your last question was, is called Memento Moori, the Art of Contemplating Death to Live a Better Life and. that book was inspired by, I was invited to give a TEDx talk many years ago now, 2016, I think. because we had a museum at the time, it's not because they were interested in death. And I went on after a standup comic and. Yeah, it was very intimidating. And I went out there and I was like, okay, I'm gonna tell them why I think this is valuable and interesting and worthwhile. wasn't convinced anyone was gonna be on board with this, but I looked out after the talk and people were into it and I thought, okay, this is interesting. There is a way to Trojan Horse these ideas into the mainstream, which is where the people who need it are, right? Like I don't need it because I'm already doing this research. And the Morbid Nanny community also. They could use it and will enjoy it, but they don't need it. And I feel like, so much of what this material is about is trying to reduce fear and the people that are afraid are not part of the Morbid Anatomy community. So basically, at that moment, I hatched this idea of how could I do

Memento Mori As A 12-Week Practice

Joanna 31:50

a larger Trojan horse that gets these ideas into mainstream? I was a big fan at that time. I still am of the book The Artist Way, which you, I'm sure you know it. Have you done the Artist Way?

Lili 32:00

Yes, absolutely. And Julia Cameron actually lives here in Santa Fe.

Joanna 32:04

Oh, that's great Have you met her?

Lili 32:06

I have not, but yes, she lives here. I've tried to get her and was not able to because she's actually still, the book is still spitting out different iterations of itself, so they're actively in their own marketing thing. But, there's a second woman in Santa Fe called Julia Cameron, and I reached out to her and she said, oh, I'm not your girl. You must mean the other Julia Cameron. So that's a funny aside, but

Joanna 32:26

That is really

Lili 32:27

Yeah,

Joanna 32:28

Yeah, so I did that book a number of times actually, and I found that whenever I was in a transition, it was such a wonderful. Container to be in a moment of transition because when you don't have a routine, you don't know what's coming next So for those listeners who don't know the artist's way, check it out. It's amazing. It's a 12 week, creativity program. And each chapter starts with text about a different concept and then. The amazing part is they end with different, journal prompts and activities that you can do that, that help activate these ideas. And it's really a way of, basically. Uncovering what you really think and what you really value versus received wisdom. And so I came up with using that as a model. Came up with a book that's a 12 week program that looks at different ways. People have looked at death through different times of place. So it's a compilation of all the work I've done over the past 20 or so years and ends with journal prompts and activities to help people be less afraid of death. But at its core, it really is also about how we can. Be ready to die. You know? And I think that is really the gift that we've lost by not having death in our lives anymore, for me personally, I wouldn't be living the life I am now and doing the things I'm doing, which are not big money makers, or not giving me security are not things that our culture deems valuable, but because. For a very early age, I've been afraid of flying. And when I get on a plane, I close my eyes and think, since I was like an adolescent, if I died on this flight, what would I wish I had done differently? And what is good and be, it's a momentum Maori practice essentially. But I think when we use the idea of the finitude of our own time on earth. In a useful way, it can help us clarify what really matters to us, and then live a life according to those values so that if we died, we'd feel fulfilled. And I think that's all we can do in the face of death, right? It's like we don't know when we're going to die, no matter what we do. No matter how healthy we are and how careful we are. We could die tomorrow. It could happen to all of us. But if you're living a life that, you feel good about leaving behind You say, well, I did what I wanted to do with my time on earth. Maybe I could have done more. I wish I could have done more. but so that's really what the book is aimed towards. So over 12 weeks, first we unpack our ideas about death and try to see where they came from again, as a way to start to, help people that aren't already on this path. Step back and see the relativity of how we happen to be brought up in our own time and place and see all these different ways people do and have thought about death that are very different and might add some value, might reduce some fear. We do activities that, focus on helping us, clarify what death even is to us. you know, if you had to imagine it, is it a male or a female? so there's all these different. Approaches to trying to make death more familiar in a fun way, in a fun, accessible, joyous way ending with, finding our own values and then ending with creativity actually, which is not how I didn't know how I was gonna end the book, but. That's where I ended up was with the idea of creativity and the imagination. And I really feel, and a longer book is an easier way to talk about this arc, but I think the tools that we've been given of creating art, of different kinds, of writing, of curation, whatever it is. Maybe is the most effective way that we have of, A, making a relationship with this thing, and B, not being afraid of it anymore. And CI don't wanna say memorializing, but I think so much of art is also. Affirmation of our individuality in the moment and our appreciation and love of this world, all of which is finite, And so I think that's where art comes in, and it's a great quote. again, I go back to Carla Jung, who's been so valuable for me. There's a Jungian thinker that I'm sure you know, Clarissa Cola Estes, who wrote, women Who Run With the Wolves and many, many other books. And she speaks a lot about creativity and she does at one point talk about how it relates to death. And what she says, and I think it's so wonderful is art exists because of the mysteries. There wouldn't be art without the mysteries. And the greatest mystery is death. And so I really think art is the way, to make a. A loving bridge towards This excised part of our lifecycle, and welcome it in. And to that note, I also teach a class on it. at Morbid Anatomy. If you go to morbid anatomy.org, it's a 12 week, six session class where we just do it as a group because I think sometimes it's really helpful to, to have a community to go through this material. 'cause it can be difficult for people, it can bring up a lot of emotions. It can bring up a lot of grief. And it can be very well done on But some people, I think having a community really helps. And I certainly love ushering people through that process. And, and again, going back to the question that you asked at the very beginning, that's why I do think it has helped people because I have met people that it helps. And I can also say. That I've met people in our community who've gone through deaths in their lives and have said to me, thank you so much for this material. I didn't expect it, but it helped me with the death of my father, for example. so I think these things even though they don't seem practical in the moment, actually are quite practical and really enrich our lives.

Lili 38:01

Well, I'm so glad to, know more about this body of material and the way you're presenting it And I'm going to suggest that people read it as a precursor to a, body

Legacy Planning And Death Cleaning

Lili 38:10

of work that we're now producing called The Art of Legacy, which is also gonna have some journal prompts and activities, but getting people to think about legacy early on, not as a, something they do later in life when they craft their will and their final affairs, but trying to get people proactively to think about their legacy, not as something that they leave to people, but something that they leave in people and how can they live their lives in a way that they are transmitting that on a regular basis. And that, again, that's very life giving, life enhancing. And so what I love about your book is that it sets everybody up. for that curiosity and that departure to that creative place of crafting what we're calling their soft legacy. So again, it's not the name on a building or the personal effects that you leave behind you, but again, we do put all this effort into curating our lives and choosing our schools and doing all these things, and then do we really think about what we're gonna leave behind? and how do we. put those values together and leave them. And one of the projects that we're talking about doing are exercises that people can do with their families so that the grandparents and the grandchildren have a new way of engaging and everything against sort of digital distance and getting people back into community.

Joanna 39:23

well that's Beautiful.

Lili 39:23

Thank you. the other thing that we are doing are these Art of conversation dinners where we put prompts underneath the dinner

Joanna 39:30

Oh, that's cool.

Lili 39:31

And sort of massage the conversation along. And even though I've done, eight of them now, every time we get to this part of the dinner where I invite people to look under their plate and we have a quote on one side and a prompt with a question on the other side. I'm always nervous because to interrupt the momentum of people and mostly it's strangers. I try to get strangers around the table and some intimacy has already started to gel, but then we start, we go around the table and everybody reads their quote and then their prompt, and I'm always nervous that I'm interrupting. What's a good conversation? And it's. I'm always surprised at how much deeper the conversation goes and they come to the party knowing that we're gonna go somewhere, but because we've been skirting around the issue, it's always me that has to be the one who kind of inserts it in. And I'm still nervous after eight things of bringing up these topics. And luckily the quotes are inspiring quotes. So the, it's, it takes a little bit of the sting out of it, but I am noticing. And the interesting thing about doing this around a dinner table to use the theme, the metaphor, the hunger and fascination for wanting to really, I. Savor these ideas, in a space that creates time to, to do this. we just don't allow a lot of time in our lives. So what you're providing is a venue for people to really do a deep dive into this. And that's why I think it's probably taken off so much. it's a real, it's a real need that we have that is an underserved need.

Joanna 41:10

Yeah. the idea of contemplating death it's a need that humans have been a swishing since. at least to Socrates and Plato and early philosophy. Right? It's, used to be seen as, The best way of living a well considered life, and now it's something we're not allowed to talk about. So that's what's happened in over a course of a certain amount of years. And actually to what you're saying, one of my favorite prompts, that is one of, one of the ones that I used when I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do at a certain point in my life, is writing your own obituary. And that is a really fun thing to do, to give you a sense of also the gap between what you want to do and your legacy and what you have done. and I've discovered new things that way too. Like I didn't realize I wanted to do that. That's really interesting. but I think what you're doing is great and I think the idea of legacy, that's something I definitely explore in the book as well. And you know, the way death doulas are creating legacy projects with people is a fantastic thing. And I think the idea of. Starting to think about that sooner is a really smart thing. and service oriented as well in a really lovely way. I think it's beautiful.

Lili 42:09

Yeah, in fact, I recently delivered a talk to. one of the Santa Fe Rotary Clubs. And because the motto of that is service above self, I tweaked the talk to say how planning for your legacy is the greatest service you can do for the people that come after you. Because as I was left high and dry by my parents who, did not have any kind of plan, it's a lot to deal with. A sudden loss, even if it's a planned loss, an eventual loss, it's gonna happen no matter what. And it just puts you into that mind space of some people think of it as e egotistical to be planning, about themselves or to write their own obituary. But really it's a huge act of self-reflection. an act of service to the people that you love and to the community. I think it's a really important seed.

Joanna 42:52

Yeah. And it makes me think too, you know, one of the things I talked about in the book is the Swedish Art of Death Cleaning, which, I love that, that was such a runaway hit. 'cause that's really about doing a lot of what you're talking about. it's about, thinking of preparing for your death as an act of love and care for the people in your life. So they don't have to, and I have been also in the aftermath of a death that was not totally unexpected, where then you have a house full of stuff and it's Painful. I watched my boyfriend go through this, trying to, having an estate sale and watching all these people niggle over your mother's China, So I think it's, a gift you can leave behind for others. And probably what happened to you. There's a, member of our community called John Troyer. And in the book, every time he gives a talk or has been a part of books of mine, he wants to include A place for you to fill out, what you want done after your death so that you have all that information for someone. And he's lost three family members, his sister, his mother, and his father. And because he has done this kind of work, he had their book of passwords for all of the things that you wouldn't even think of. And so the book the, the Momentum Maori, the Art of Cons Plane, death to Live a Better Life. I do have a bunch of practical things in there too that were the advice of death, doulas in the community of what. People should do to prepare. And that's just another way that you can help, make the lives of your loved ones easier, especially at a time when maybe they just wanna grieve, then have to do all this bureaucratic stuff. I can only imagine you probably had to do that yourself, and I can't imagine how, ugh, how painful and different, and boring when all you wanna do is think about the deeper meaning of something to be like just stuck in this morass of everyday life. Ugh.

Lili 44:32

Well, I've thought about that so many times and in some ways sometimes dealing with all those bullshit. Details is a way to give your body a way to metabolize some of the grief. And because invariably it comes up in waves a year later, five years later, 10 years later, 20 years later. And for me it's now 20, 30 and 40 years later that, that this project has come to be. And I understood why I was motivated to do it, but I had no idea the healing effect that it would have and how. The fact that I'm doing it 30 years on instead of when it was fresh, how much more perspective I have and how much more I've assimilated and how much more present I can be with other people's stories. and to just be able to kind of, add it to the whole stew of what's possible. it's really such a blessing and I never would've thought. That these early losses would translate into such a life-giving chapter of my whole life. you know, this whole decade is gonna become about that. And it's taken yeah, 30 and 40 years. So it's ama it is amazing. So I'm gonna put you on the spot because, I, I haven't handled this myself, but with all of your thoughts around this. Do you have a, a plan for your artful exit?

Joanna’s Own Artful Exit Plan

Joanna 45:49

I definitely have written up some stuff that I, that is a document that my husband has The ritual of my death should be, I like to leave to the people I left behind, because I think it needs to be meaningful to them. But I definitely want it to be fun. I would like my body to be composted ideally. I think that's my favorite of all of them, if possible. In Mexico, I'm not even sure. I actually don't care that much. I don't, I'm not fussy about my body. A lot of people really are. it's a big question. The body isn't that important to me. But my will, everything goes to Morbid Anatomy and that's really my legacy is Morbid Anatomy. And to that end, we're becoming a nonprofit this year because someone in the community, Kaitlyn Doty, who I'm sure you know, she's, a wonderful. death advocate. She runs the order for the good death. when we talked a few years ago, she was like, if you want it to live beyond you, that's the best thing you can do. I've since looked into that. I agree that that's right. So I'm right now transitioning to, allow this community to, to live beyond me. So that's my legacy project really.

Lili 46:48

I'm so glad to hear that. That's just wonderful. And do you have some other projects that are sort of on the horizon that you wanna share or

Joanna 46:55

Yes. I, what I will say per our conversation is for those of your listeners who might be in the New York area or coming to New York, There was a collection, I dunno if you've heard of it. There was a museum called Lila Hair Museum in Independence, Missouri. Does that ring a bell for you? No. So in the Victorian era, one of the crafts that women would create would be artworks out of human hair of the dead. And also not just the dead, but sometimes it was like a family tree in a time before photography. Often it was memorial. And so people would take hair from the. The dead loved one or the pre dead loved one, and then work it into jewelry or lockets, but also these large wall hanging pieces, so some signs of photos, dates and things like that. And, so Lila ran this hair museum from the eighties until she died just recently. And she lived a good, long life. She was obsessed with hair. She was a hairdresser herself. And when she died, most of her family, she did not have a legacy and I guess is what I'm gathering,

Hair Art Exhibition And Upcoming Projects

Joanna 47:55

but most of her family said, let's just get rid of this collection. let's, sell the place. And she had a granddaughter. Lindsay who reached out to us because she was determined to keep her grandmother's legacy alive. And so she reached out to like-minded institutions to see if they would be willing to accept a gift, a part of the collection, along with information about Leila that would be made, available to the public. So we're taking 49 of those pieces. and they're incredible. some of them are. wall hanging pieces, there's jewelry, there's all sorts of things, and we will be installing that this summer. we did a fundraiser, a Kickstarter fundraiser, because even though it was a gift, the cost of shipping, things that fragile, these are 19th century objects, glass shadow boxes, quite intense. So luckily we raised the funds, and that will be opening in Brooklyn in the last week in September.

Lili 48:48

Cool. Well, the last question I have before we sign off is, do you know about Jill Mag's project? You're in Mexico. I know that it's in Mexico City, but Jill Maggot is a another Brooklyn based, artist who took a fascination with. architect Lewis Barakon, who is the architect in Mexico. He is very well known for those color block buildings. He was a contemporary architect, so he the very quick story, but he died and then his entire body of work, his whole archive was purchased by a Swiss. Art collector as an engagement present. It was given to her as an engagement present by her fiance. She was supposed to be archiving that and then making it public. Well, 30 years is gone. it hasn't happened yet. And so Jill Mag a documentary about her fascination with this project and her urgency to get the body of work back to Mexico and back to Mexico City. And so she conspired with members from the Mexican government and his family. His ashes had been interred in a wall. She took the ashes out, had some of them removed, turned it into a diamond ring. That she then offered, and the movie is called The Proposal. the film that she created is called The Proposal. And since you're in Mexico, I thought it would be really interesting for you to look into it and it would be an amazing Morbid anatomy story because, and I won't tell you the punchline, of course, anybody who sees the movie knows the punchline, but apparently the ring is still in the barakon. Museum in Mexico and you can visit it and it's there available for this woman collector whenever she chooses to swap out her collection for this diamond ring.

Joanna 50:21

Wow. No, I don't know anything about that. I'll have to check it out. Thank you so much.

Lili 50:25

Well, this has just been an incredible, uh, conversation. I knew I was looking forward to it, and I'm so glad we got to do it. you're gonna be back, obviously, in Brooklyn for the opening in September. are you gonna be up here anytime before that?

Joanna 50:40

I don't know yet. I don't think so, but we'll be doing also. the other thing that's happening at that time, which might be interesting to your audience, I'm not sure, is I did a book recently on the Art of Fairytales, and that will be coming out through Lawrence King and we'll be doing a book launch also at the end of September, New York, and then the following weekend, the first week in October. For those in LA we'll be doing a big popup at the Philosophical Research Society. It'll be a two day morbid anatomy fest, but kind of focus on fairytales.

Lili 51:08

How cool is that? and I definitely say again out loud the, URL for the trip that you're organizing for the Leo Nora Carrington.

Joanna 51:17

Yeah. So go to morbid anatomy.org and then there you'll see trips and if you click on trips, you'll see it right there on the website.

Lili 51:24

I really hope I can do that.

Joanna 51:25

And please come. Oh, it's amazing. I mean, honestly, I. I love sales trips and they're life changing and having a guide like that to show you around, these incredible cultures and to be a part of Day of the Dead in general, I'm sure in Santa Fe you've got lots of great Day of the Dead celebrations.

Lili 51:41

We do, but nothing like what goes on down there, I'm sure.

Joanna 51:44

It's really extraordinary and it's life changing to, to be a part of a culture that, that has such a different attitude about death in the body and, memory.

Lili 51:53

and Leonora Carrington is one of my all time favorites,

Joanna 51:56

Yeah, likewise.

Lili 51:57

would be just so amazing. Yeah. Yeah. Well, thank you so much. I really appreciate this time.

Joanna 52:03

you. Thanks for having me. It was a pleasure.

Lili 52:06

Enjoy Mexico.

Joanna 52:07

Thank you. Good luck with the rest of your project. Bye.

Lili 52:09

Take

Support Art Storming And Art Bridge

Lili 52:10

care. Bye. Bye.

Speaker 4 52:11

So thanks for joining us today. Art Storming is brought to you and supported by Art Bridge, nm. And listeners like you look for us on your favorite podcast platforms or wherever you listen. Your subscriptions, likes, comments, and shares. Help us to reach more listeners and attract the support we need to thrive in these challenging times. If you love what you hear, please consider making a contribution. We rely on your help to keep these conversations going. Every dollar you contribute goes directly into programs that support our mission, and we've been offered a matching grant that will match every dollar that you contribute. That means more compelling stories, more in-depth articles, and an even greater impact on our community. Please visit our website@www.art bridge nm.org and thank you so much for being an essential part of our work.