Memories Designers: How Everyday Objects Evoke Our Deceased
摘要
This work addresses the aesthetic and evocative power of the objects belonging to our deceased; specifically, it examines how these objects shape and design the aesthetic experience we have of them. To this end, it draws on the aesthetics of everyday life and its two variants: in the weak variant (identified with Thomas Leddy, among others thinkers), the treatment of the object as a relic that one barely touches, results in the memory of the deceased remaining a fairly superficial sympathetic connection. In contrast, in the strong variant (primarily associated with Yuriko Saito’s ideas), by restoring the object’s utility, that is, by fully engaging with it, an empathetic immersion in the deceased occurs, leading to a much more intense recollection. The ultimate aim here is to propose the experience of remembering our deceased, activated by their belongings and shaped by them in either of the two aforementioned variants, as a fully aesthetic experience.