#funerary practice

Famadihana is a funerary tradition practiced in Madagascar. It involves exhuming the remains of family members from their crypts, wrapping them in a fresh, silk cloth and dancing with the corpses to live music around the tomb. It is also known as ‘the turning of the bones’. The custom is based on the belief that the spirits of the dead can join the world of the ancestors only after their body has fully decomposed and certain rituals have been completed, It takes place every 7 years and involves the gathering of the extended family.

May I see in a basket the entrails of the priest  may I tear them with my teeth and rub them in my hands in the house of the priest you hear the Devil’s cry infamous priest, excommunicated  dog-eater of the sacraments may you die in anguish  in spasms and in torments. 

What an amazing thing to sing at a funeral. 

Examples of paper offerings meant to be burned during traditional Chinese funeral ceremonies such as the Qing Ming Festival (Tomb-Sweeping Day), as a way of paying respect and presenting gifts to ancestors. These paper effigies often represented objects, animals, or people that gave the deceased pleasure and comfit in life, such as tech gadgets, dogs, clothing, money, food, and even a rice-cooker!

Mourning garment

Some of the images from Hong Kong artist Kurt Tong’s photographic series, “In Case it Rains in Heaven” (2009) that documented joss paper offerings in China, burned for the deceased. These offerings may be gold or silver spirit money, and in the last 50 years reflected the growth of consumerism in China with paper replicas of elaborate items such as cars, servants, houses, dentures, fans, iPhones, etc. All items in Tong’s works were burnt as offerings to his ancestors (watch video).

Design graduate Au-yeung Ping-Chi has followed his father’s craft of making Taoist paper effigies used by those mourning the dead. The burning of joss paper at Chinese temples, crematoria, and grave sites is a common practice in Chinese religion, especially Taoism, to ensure the dead are provided for in the afterlife. Paper money or effigies are used to imitate the appearance of objects used by the living.

Ping-Chi’s father, Au-yeung Wai-kin, founded Bo Wah Effigies in Hong Kong’s Sham Shui Po in the 1960s, and their shop is filled with joss paper accessories, or “zi zaatz” 紙紮 which are burnt along with the joss paper. “Zi zaat” 紙紮 have traditionally been gold, money, and servant effigies, but now also include modern items such as smartphones, laptops, electric guitars, and cars. Since Au-yeung senior began working in the business as a teen in the 1940s, there have been many changes, including the opening up of mainland China that has brought cheaper machine-made paper versions to market. Business has declined also due to people not believing in the afterlife anymore. According to the master, there are hardly anymore ‘situs’ of their craft.

Paper version of sports shoes as votive offerings, to be burnt for the dead. Made from cardboard, pigment, paper, foil, cord (synthetic braid), metal (staple), and possible plastic. Dimensions: 26.5 (l) x 9.8 (w) x 10.2 (h) cm. Acquired in south China in 1999.