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'Nieuwe Ooster' Daily activities around death

16.10.2009
Amsterdam, the Netherlands

This is a self initiated serie about the daily live & activities around death I made on the cemetery "De Nieuwe Ooster."
The staff of marketing of "De Nieuwe Ooster" asked me to photograph their "Allerzielen", which is a gathering end of October in honour of the death. From then on I became obsessed by the cemetery with it's rich history (it was first openend in 1894) and went for morning walks during a cold winter period. This is a no-going series . My idea is to capture the ordinary , normality around death. It is such a big part of our lives, but it seems so kept away. People who work at the Nieuwe Ooster all have something in common, they are familiar with death, daily ceremonies of .. but also the practical choises of what urn someone want, how to arrange the music, and to start the machine that (verbrijzeld ) the bones in the crematorium . They so much realise all people are more equal, they all at a certain age get close to death and losing someone close.


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