ZERSTREUUNG - THE CEMETERY OF DISTRACTION

My Second Body is a playful entity shrouded in the shadows of my primary body’s emotions. In this project for a cemetery and playground landscape, the Second Body’s sole purpose began with an aim to build a sense of comfort within the context of Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. In the narrative I created, this ghostly character evolved, manipulating light and shadows to make gentle distractions for those who wander the mundane realm that is the cemetery, in hopes to change attitudes on death. Death does not perform on an even playing field to life. This is evident in the era we live in, where we are afraid to age, afraid to die and afraid to grieve. Society is fixated on everlasting youth and we have still to accept that death gives life meaning, yet this is often forgotten due to western culture’s disconnection to passing. The creation of this proposal was a way to question presumptions about death and ways of mourning, and how architecture can play a role in addressing them. The project incorporates dark humour and camp elements, weaving play and funerary rituals together in a way that is meant to be uncanny and comforting at once. A crematorium anchors its centre; processional routes emanate from it. These are places that aim to evoke emotion, punctuated by shadows which project over the mundane from the spirit world.