post-mortem dolls

Post-mortem photography, particularly of children seems to retain a sense of mystery and a doll like atmosphere. There is a sense that the body has become a material to be recreated and dressed much like they would have liked to have seen the child in life. A sort of nostalgic recollection etched into memory.. more real in death then in life. Many comments have been made on the subject.. some related to the fact that these are just dead children.. and that is all.. no sense of putting an atmosphere around it that wasn't there. This is true in a sense.. it is nothing more then that for some people living today (much like an actual haunted house is no more then a house), but back then in the 19th century there was a very big search and quest to see and speak with the dead.. to touch the spirits that seemed to live with us yet separate. Living with the dead was something that was seen by all to be a part of their lives.. and something not to be parted with or thrown aside.. a keep sake... something to hold dear.. There was a sense that the dead bodies retained some sense of soul.. some sort of spirit and atmosphere... a haunted feeling.. a similarity in part to dolls possibly..

- s

(most of these images may have been seen over and over.. but i picked out certain ones to pinpoint the look and feeling of how close the reference is to : a doll, the look of the living compared to the dead, angelic, a sense of a presence within the body, a haunted atmosphere)

(in this one the girl on the left is dead, the right one is alive)