The Morbidly Fascinating Page |
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The Morbidly Fascinating Page This Month's Subject: Images from Sleeping Beauty II Stanley B. Burns, MD |
FROM THE MORBID ARCHIVES: Famous Deaths |
Everyone has heard about the Sleeping Beauty Series from the Burns Archive Libraries. Now The Horror Zine lets you glimpse into Sleeping Beauty II, the second in a series of three books. ALL IMAGES ON THIS PAGE ARE FROM THE BOOK "SLEEPING BEAUTY II" Man lies next to deceased wife (below): Double funeral: The final moments in her son's life: Grown man: Elderly woman: Child propped on chair: Man in white gloves with elderly parents:
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More Victorian Memorial Photography (not from Sleeping Beauty books) HERE Sleeping Beauty II: Grief, Bereavement and the Family in Memorial Photography HERE Memorial photography was a method to deal with grief in Victorian times. People were not usually photographed in life, so their loved ones wanted a memorial: a last look. It was a way to honor and cherish their loved ones after death, to have a lasting memory. Death from disease was common. The proprietor and curator of the Burns Archive, a large collection of early medical and 19th-century documentary photography in New York, Stanley Burns and his daughter, Elizabeth, have produced a sumptuous volume of beautifully reproduced postmortem photographs, expanding on his 1991 volume, Sleeping Beauty: Memorial Photography in America. Photographs from 15 countries, ranging from the earliest daguerreotypes to present-day color snapshots, show that since the invention of photography survivors have sought to fix their memory of deceased loved ones. These disturbing and strangely beautiful images depict children and adults, famous people and those buried en masse, as well as advertising photographs for a mortuary, a World War I German grave marker, and an Afghan hound in its satin-lined casket. With essays and picture titles in both French and English, this book is comprehensive and unique. Highly recommended for photohistory collections and those dealing with anthropology, sociology, and the history of medicine. Kathleen Collins, Bank of America Corporate Archives, San Francisco Below: Girl with decompostion. Many times the photographer was not immediately available. Below: Deceased girl propped on chair Below: poem Below: Loss of twins
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