Symposium looks at art, mortality and fascination with death

People are fascinated by death and mortality because we want to know we can die the best way we can, the Director of Australian National University (ANU) Centre for Art History and Theory, Helen Ennis says.

Professor Ennis is convening a two-day symposium called Art and Mortality on 19-20 September in a partnership between the Australian National University and the National Gallery of Australia.

The symposium will hear from more than 20 speakers – including artists, curators and academics to discuss ideas relating to mortality and the visual arts.

“I think you’d say it’s been one of the great themes in the visual arts. People say love, sex and death are the things we’ve long been fascinated with. Dealing with death in visual ways has always been there across cultures and across media,” Professor Ennis said.

Professor Ennis says the simple fact of being human means we have an interest in death.

“I think in contemporary society we’re concerned with dying the best way we can. And it means that we want to help those who are dying to have good deaths. We are very keen to know how artists deal with this subject, what it is they have to say to us,” she said.

One of the key speakers, New Zealand artist Anne Noble, will speak about her experiences in studying death in an intimate way. Professor Noble created a photographic work, focusing on her father’s death.

“Her father died and his body was kept at home while they were waiting for family to come to their house. That meant for a week their dad was laid out on a bed where Anne was able to photograph him. She accompanied his body through all the stages that you go through – from home to the funeral parlour and on to the crematorium,” Professor Ennis said.

More information on the event is available on the ANU School of Art website and the National Gallery of Australia website.