Jeehey KIM (City University of New York)
“Photography in Between Death and Life”

This paper explores how funerary photo-portraiture, which is called Yeongjung (影幀) in Korean and I-ei (遺影) in Japanese, challenge the boundary between death and life. The notion of death as transformation of being rather than its extermination is intertwined with the presence of funerary photo-portraiture in funeral and annual ancestor worship ritual. In addition, photograph of the dead functions as useful apparatus for state ritual and memorial practice in public space. Funerary photo-portraiture exists as the alive dead rather than memento mori à la Roland Barthes or reminder of the dead. One’s transformation as ancestor god or national deity (kami) raises a question of boundary between human being and god, which leads to the question of constituents of human being itself.

Photography, with its evidential power, seems the best medium for resisting indifference toward the Other, and preventing amnesia. Popular culture has continued to revisit particular parts of the past, rendering them vivid and familiar while at the same time remaining silent to others. These choices are no doubt related to a political economy in cultural products that presume their audience’s interest and level of knowledge, which are in turn also constructed by our social system. This paper explores commemorating one as a national symbol through funerary photo-portraiture brings the question of the Other, and how one’s commemorative practices sometimes create antagonism from the Other.



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