Cemetery Walks: An Encaustic Collection
Cemeteries are often associated with being: spooky, haunted, creepy, depressing, lonely, weird, unsettling, and even ugly. When I tell people I walk in cemeteries, these are the words I hear.I have always seen them as beautiful. I have always been drawn to them. Perhaps I have my parents to thank for my lifelong fascination with the ways in which we honor, and bury, our dead. It is just one of the many pearls on a necklace full of gratitude I have for them.Have you ever walked a cemetery during the daytime?
You will notice, then, that they are often meticulously landscaped, with clean cut lawns and every kind of blossoming tree and shrub surrounding them. I see signs of life everywhere, from the potted plants before gravestones to the bees and butterflies going on with their own busy lives as they keep the endless cycle of the natural world moving. Personally, I have always been drawn to the Victorian era, so it is no surprise that the tombstones themselves are my favorite part. The vast array of architectural options never ceases to amaze me, and I have a soft spot in my heart for any edifice taken over by some resilient ivy. But perhaps the most moving part of all is my ability to stand here, take it all in, and feel endless gratitude for the breath that fills my lungs. I believe that walking with our own mortality each day is the greatest gift we can give ourselves. We are told our days are numbered, but standing WITH death has been the most generative practice for living a fully realized life. Whenever I fall asleep to myself, when I let the stresses of a daily human existence cloud my gratitude, I come here. I would challenge you to do the same. Look down at your feet as you walk, and with each step say, “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.” How you show up in the world is how you will be remembered. Thank you for being here.I am so glad that you were born.
May 31, 2022
9:20am
My good friend Dani lost her life partner to a sudden heart attack nearly 3 months ago. I had a dream about them the night it happened, and when I texted her to check in, she replied, “I just wanna die.” That was how I got the news. I was at the hospital the next day, and sitting in the parking lot when they donated his organs, but I haven’t been able to see her too much since then.
I finally got a chance to visit yesterday, and she shared a playlist that she had put together of all their favorite songs. I am driving to the studio and the song “To Build A Home” comes on, and I feel as though they are in the car with me, as though I am their third wheel right somehow. I smile, and see the cemetery I pass every day on the way to work, and instinctively pull in. I know he’s not buried here, but that doesn’t matter.
I had packed an English muffin for breakfast: cream cheese and smoked salmon, my favorite.
I think a picnic breakfast in a cemetery is just what I need right now.
I grab the clippers I keep in the center console. (I know myself too well by now. I can’t leave without a souvenir.)
It is on this morning that the idea for the series you see now took shape.
Zion Lutheran Church
Spring City, PA
July 12, 2022
9am
I am disappointed that it has taken me six full weeks to get here. When I mentally committed to taking weekly cemetery walks this summer I wasn’t accounting for the actual summering that happens, particularly when you have three kids under 5. No matter. I knew my next stop would be the cemetery where Chris was buried, so I went. I realized as I pulled in that I had no idea where he was buried, but I remembered Dani telling me that it was within earshot of a house- she comes here every night and marvels at how other people’s families just keep doing what they always do, while hers has shattered completely.
I drive along the edge.
I am looking for a hummingbird feeder.
That, and a family that yells a lot.
It took me 5 minutes to find it.
The house in question is littered with signs of small children: a giant trampoline, a plastic playhouse, and a dog. I sit down and imagine Dani doing this every night, eating her dinner in front of a temporary plaque with a yellow fishing hook clipped to the right side. The wind chimes are a nice touch.
Just then, a van slows down and comes to a stop. The woman is clearly headed for right where I’m seated.
I think I gave her that same look you give a stranger at the doorway, that momentary guard put up before an introduction.
It was Chris’s mom, here to water the flowers. His brother is buried beside him and now she has two sons to visit in the ground.
I don’t know what to say. For all my talk about being friends with death I still don’t know how to look a mother in the eye and say anything of substance while images of my own sons cloud my mind.
She’s friendly, of course, and I don’t tell her about my project, lest I appear to be a modern day grave robber. I’m wondering if I should do this at all, but the light hits a patch of bindweed and I’m off with my clippers, unable to restrain myself.
Many of the tombstones here have artificial flowers before them, and I notice the petals of a chewed up purple one and add them to my basket. Within 20 minutes my small basket is overflowing and the July sun is brutal even at 9:30 in the morning.
I have the perfect frame back at the studio, a heavy concrete easel back with arches on either side of a three scalloped opening. I bought it a year ago, saving it for something that might fit.
I head to the studio & get to work.
St. Aloysius Cemetery
Pottstown, PA
July 20
9:50am
I’ve committed to a walk a week now, but with no idea where to go next. I’m lost in thought and halfway to the studio before I remember that I need to stop, so I quickly look up cemeteries in the area. I head to Green Tree Cemetery and when I arrive just before 10am it is hot and bright, not a cloud in the sky. The grass looks like it needs a good watering, and I realize there’s a fresh grave to my right. The funeral must have been a week ago or so, the flower arrangements are still on top, withering to a crisp under this hot summer sun.
I think these are the images that give people chills when they see it- the mound of a fresh grave giving them visions a ghost lurking nearby, a soul not ready to let go just yet. When I look up and see the blue sky I think of how I may not feel so comfortable being here at night, under the blanket of darkness. I don’t plan to do these walks then, but I end up making a piece that is unlike any of the others. It is messy and jumbled, like the gravesite, and I pour blue wax for day and black wax for night- a mish-mash of skies under which this fresh soul now sleeps.
Green Tree Cemetery
Collegeville, PA
July 28
11:45am
My eyes are now trained to find cemeteries at all times, and it is on my morning preschool drop-off that I realize I’ve been passing one as I take my son to school every day. I make a mental note to circle back.
A white washed one room church sits along the road, a building long since closed for good. The word I think of to describe this place is “unobtrusive”. It’s cute (if I can describe it as such), with low headstones and a stone wall surrounding the place. When I pull in I notice the wall is completely covered in moss, so I get out to pet it, as you would a dog on a walk- equal parts curious and smitten. Before I enter I already know I want this piece to be a circle with moss all along the edge- I can see it clearly before I’ve even begun. I don’t end up collecting the same things I did before- I want the textural pieces of nature, like the sticks covered in lichens, the milkweed pods, the bird feathers & grasses. It feels good to have a vision this time, but I still enjoy the walk, and marvel at the personality the church gives to this place. I wish I could go inside, but perhaps it is because I can’t that I’m so intrigued. I sit and imagine the people buried here all going to service in this north facing room, with no air conditioning to escape the heat as I have now. I don’t have the stamina to sit for long, the noonday sun is brutal, and I leave lost in admiration of the resiliency of all the humans that came before us.
East Coventry Mennonite Cemetery
Pottstown, PA
August 2, 2022
10:30am
It is hot and windy, an unusual combination. Johnny insists we use his Paw Patrol backpack for our adventure together. I can’t stop smiling. No one is around, and while adults see this as a cemetery, my kid sees it as a park. He’s running everywhere, and I can barely keep up as his eyes light up at each new tombstone, each one different than the last. Some are all connected, one lengthwise piece of concrete with 5 heads jutting out, some taller than the both of us combined, while others are merely the size of my shoe.
“Mommy! Look at this one! It’s so cute and little. It’s Charlie’s size.”
Johnny is learning his letters at school.
“N-A-O-M-I. Mommy, what does that spell?” He will learn the words “mother” and “father” quickly if he spends a day reading here.
We begin our foraging adventure. I let him use the scissors. He is closer to the ground than I am, so he notices the buttercups before I do.
I am recording this whole thing on my phone. I really can’t help myself. I can feel how important this day is for me, and how much I will want to remember every little thing he says.
After dropping Johnny off at school, I proudly hike the four flights of stairs to my studio with his Paw Patrol backpack on my back. I love how I feel like he’s with me in that simple object.
I pick one of the biggest frames I have for the piece, a 14”x17” wood carved oval that called to me. My brain turns off when the wax melts, and somehow the composition just comes without me trying.
The cemetery we went to is surrounded by an old stone wall covered in ivy, and from the road that was the part that drew me in. I wanted to pay homage to that experience here. I took a long S curved vine I’d cut and placed it directly in the center, allowing it to seemingly split the frame in two, jutting out with no intention of pushing it back inside. I wanted the ivy to draw you in. The resulting piece was heavily inspired by a fellow artist named Jacyln Gordyan who also creates sculptural art. I let the massive frame and the many layers of wax required to fill it allow me to add elements like walnuts and moss covered bark. My hands were covered in dirt by the end.
Reformed Church at Providence
Trappe, PA
August 11, 2022
10:45am
There is a woman who works at my son’s school who I try to talk to in quick bursts during drop off and pick up. She notices my skull ring one day, and we start talking about our common love for cemeteries. She shows me a photo on her phone from a place she walks to from her house, and in it the sun is rising on a gorgeous hill and I know I must go there.
She leaves her job at the school shortly after this interaction, and I awkwardly ask for her phone number, just in case.
Summer is coming to an end, and so will this series, so I decide to embark on a walk with company this time. This is a further drive than the others, but I think it’s worth taking more time out of my day to do this before I stop, and because I’ve been struggling this week to make time for myself and it’s starting to make me cranky. I could use the friendship and the exercise.
She meets me after I’ve eaten my turkey and cheese sandwich under the shadow of an obelisk and we walk for over an hour. I bring the foraging backpack my mom helped me buy two birthdays ago, and the entire time I’m filling it, fully aware I’ll never be able to make a single piece with all I’ve collected.
She tells me story after story about her life while I marvel at the lush pathways she knows by heart. I’m grateful for a guide, and it allows me to notice things like white fluff layering the grass, supposedly a release of seeds from the surrounding and cottonwood trees. There are butterflies everywhere and I leave with three blue robin feathers in my hair.
I decide to use the biggest frame I have for this piece, and for that I need to do some repairs. A friend of mine had gifted me a massive, ornate metal frame about 3 years ago, and it’s been sitting in the corner waiting for a catalyst to fix it up. A few new screws and many layers of encaustic wax later, and I had my biggest and heaviest piece to date.
New Goshenhoppen UCC Cemetery
East Greenville, PA
August 17 2022
12:30pm
Everyone in this area knows of Laurel Hill Cemetery. It is one of the oldest and largest cemeteries in the city of Philadelphia, and with a full fledged staff they host a wide array of events like tours, concerts, and even a book club, with a website that reads, “Grace & Beauty in Life & Death”. To say it is a one-of-a-kind place would be an understatement. My husband and I attended a candlelit concert overlooking the riverbank last October, and that was enough to find a starting place on the 74 acre property.
Death has a way of visiting those we know and love often. Before this walk, my brother in law lost his father somewhat quickly, and he had only just come back from his two week long pause on “normal” life to be with his family as they guided him to the other side together.
I asked him if he would like to join me for my final walk for the series. He said yes.
My final walk was less of a walk and more of a listen. He told me everything, and as the sun moved across the sky- our only way of marking time as we fully disconnected from the world- I could feel how this self imposed assignment took on a life all its own.
Laurel Hill Cemetery
Philadelphia, PA
