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I'm a PhD student researching the role of the archaeological dead in contemporary British society. Think of this as a scrapbook of all the interesting links, snippets of information and random bits and bobs I come across pertaining to death, dying and the dead. Enjoy?!

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    The Fascinating Last Photographs of Famous People This week marks the 32nd anniversary of Rolling Stone’s famous cover featuring a portrait of John Lennon and Yoko Ono, photographed by Annie Leibovitz. It was the last professional photo captured of the iconic musician, who was killed hours later outside his apartment in New York City. We’re discounting the chilling image fan Paul Goresh took of Lennon and Chapman that fateful morning. “What is interesting is she said she’d take her top off and I said, ‘Leave everything on’ — not really preconceiving the picture at all,” Leibovitztold the magazine. “Then he curled up next to her and it was very, very strong. You couldn’t help but feel that he was cold and he looked like he was clinging on to her. I think it was amazing to look at the first Polaroid and they were both very excited. John said, ‘You’ve captured our relationship exactly. Promise me it’ll be on the cover.’ I looked him in the eye and we shook on it.” Leibovitz had only planned to photograph Lennon, but the image of the couple turned out to be one of her most famous portraits and would define one of the most talked about relationships in pop culture history. We scouted for other fascinating photographs that perhaps offer some insight into the final days of famous people. Click here for more.

    The Fascinating Last Photographs of Famous People

    This week marks the 32nd anniversary of Rolling Stone’s famous cover featuring a portrait of John Lennon and Yoko Ono, photographed by Annie Leibovitz. It was the last professional photo captured of the iconic musician, who was killed hours later outside his apartment in New York City. We’re discounting the chilling image fan Paul Goresh took of Lennon and Chapman that fateful morning.

    “What is interesting is she said she’d take her top off and I said, ‘Leave everything on’ — not really preconceiving the picture at all,” Leibovitztold the magazine. “Then he curled up next to her and it was very, very strong. You couldn’t help but feel that he was cold and he looked like he was clinging on to her. I think it was amazing to look at the first Polaroid and they were both very excited. John said, ‘You’ve captured our relationship exactly. Promise me it’ll be on the cover.’ I looked him in the eye and we shook on it.”

    Leibovitz had only planned to photograph Lennon, but the image of the couple turned out to be one of her most famous portraits and would define one of the most talked about relationships in pop culture history. We scouted for other fascinating photographs that perhaps offer some insight into the final days of famous people.

    Click here for more.

    Kurt Cobain, before the age of the digital zombies

    As Courtney Love cedes all rights to Cobain’s image, where it will be used in an age of CGI and holograms is anyone’s guess

    Even the background of this picture is a ghost. Kurt Cobain stands on West 42nd Street in Manhattan in 1993, in front of a semi-derelict cinema bearing the words Men Don’t Protect You Anymore. The photographer had noticed it and Cobain dug the idea of posing in front of it. Soon he would be gone and so would the grungy squalor of this part of New York, reclaimed and turned into a street of multiplexes, safe for tourists. Cobain shot himself in 1994. This week, it emerged in reports that his widow Courtney Love has ceded all rights in the licensing of his name and image to their daughter Frances Bean in return for a large loan.

    These “publicity rights” are said to be immensely valuable. Of course they are: in a world where the dead can be made to walk and talk, images of dead celebrities may turn out to be among the most valuable commodities of this century.

    There has not, so far, been a hologram appearance by Cobain at a music festival to match the recent return of Tupac Shakur to live performance. Tupac, who was killed in 1996, materialised as an electronic ghost at the Coachella music festival crying: “What the (blank) is up, Coachella?” It is clearly no coincidence that this bizarre Frankensteinian experiment took place in California, home to the world’s most advanced computer engineers. It is also no surprise that in a culture infected by digital utopianism it was reported using words like “resurrected” and “returned from the dead” when in reality the new Tupac is a digital zombie manipulated by its creator, not an animate being, not “resurrected” at all. What is the future for such zombies of the famous? What is the future for Kurt Cobain?

    Food for thought. Click through for the rest!