You won't remain
But you'll get the freedom to live your life
I’ve always been drawn to cemeteries. Of course, there is a superficial explanation - the stereotype of goth subculture, necessitating a fascination with death and its associated spaces. But as a photographer, the attraction has outlasted mere aesthetic interest.
What continues to engage me isn’t morbidity. It’s actually comfort.
Cemeteries have always held a peculiar gravity. They are often treated as places of reverence or unease, yet they function just as clearly as records of how humans relate to time, memory, and each other.
These spaces sit at the intersection of care and disregard. No matter the location, some graves are maintained with precision and regularity, shaped by lives that are still remembered and relationships that continue beyond death. This care is of course reassuring, offering clear evidence that love, attention, and meaning can extend past a lifetime.
Alongside these, however, are the forgotten. Markers left to weather, names eroded or unreadable, and plots that are slowly but surely reclaimed by the surrounding landscape. Occasionally, a stranger intervenes - a stone is cleaned, a fence repaired - but more often than not, these sites are simply allowed to exist at the mercy of the world.
This condition is not inherently tragic, however.
Neglect offers us clarity. It shows us the reality that significance is temporary, that time does not preserve importance by default, and that influence fades regardless of intention. Change continues. Movement continues. Humanity marches on.
The future decides what it carries forward, and what it leaves behind. Most lives will not be remembered forever, and this is neither failure nor injustice - it is simply how time (and reality) works.
The Remains photoseries leaves us to dwell in this space between remembrance and inevitability. The imagery of death is a symbol of continuity, and loss is a driver for acceptance. What remains is not only stone and soil, but the evidence of a shared human tendency to care deeply. And then, eventually, move on.
May we live life as though we aren’t important - and accept that this is enough.
