MORBID INK
The Human Memorial Tattoo with Dr John Troyer
At Brompton Cemetery Chapel on Saturday 19th October 2019 at 1 pm

There is a saying within the tattooing profession: Love lasts forever, but a tattoo lasts six months longer. In this age where most of us will not be remembered on tombstones we may find we live on in the form of a memorial tattoo on the arm or torso of a loved one. Having a tattoo made can not only ease the pain of bereavement but keep the memory of the deceased actively in the mind.

Dr Troyer will talk about the implications of marking a living body with representations of death and discuss current innovations in memorial tattooing, including the practice of mixing the cremated ashes of a loved one in the ink that will be used to create the tattoo, thus forming a physical as well as symbolic link to the deceased.

Tickets £12 including a Hendrick's gin cocktail.

Dr. John Troyer  is the Director of the Centre for Death and Society at the University of Bath. His interdisciplinary research focuses on contemporary memorialization practices, concepts of spatial historiography, and the dead body’s relationship with technology. Dr. Troyer is also a theatre director and installation artist with extensive experience in site-specific performance across the United States and Europe. He is a co-founder of the Death Reference Desk website (http://www.deathreferencedesk.org), the Future Cemetery Project (http://www.futurecemetery.com) and a frequent commentator for the BBC. His forthcoming book, Technologies of the Human Corpse (published by MIT Press), will appear in 2020.

 

 

Brompton Cemetery, London.