"Copia-Elegy for The Souls on Hold"
Community-engaged interactive art project devoted to loss and grief in pandemic times
Have you lost a loved one during the Covid-19 pandemic?
If so, I am sincerely sorry for your loss. Every person might cope with grief differently, but we all feel pain and miss our loved ones. In social isolation, the lack of funeral rituals around grieving makes it even more challenging to cope and find closure. I know how it feels: like trapped in a web of sorrow and despair without any breaks. I missed the funerals of my sister Albita and three close family members in Venezuela.
In their loving memory of our missing loved one, I come to offer you my art. Elegy for The Souls on Hold is an interactive and immersive installation that provides us with an evocative virtual space to acknowledge our grief and showcase our loved one's life memories in photos and told by us.
Please join me. Together, we can pay our missed loved ones a eulogy that will endure in our Elegy viewers' memories while revealing the saddest part of social distancing.
I am developing the project in collaboration with AR & VR developer Diego Camacho and AVA Animation & Visual Arts. The city of Toronto supports the project as part of their public art program called ArtworxTO, the Year of the public Art.
Additional Information
Who might want to participate in this Elegy project?
- Anyone who has lost a loved one during the pandemic due to any death circumstances
- People who could not attend in-person funerals could not gather with family and friends to grieve their loved ones' loss
- People whose loved ones' funeral rites, despite religions or cultural backgrounds, were cancelled or postponed due to the imposed social distance restrictions.
How to participate
Kindly follow these steps:
- Step 1: Choose a portrait of your loved one in JPG format
- Step 2: Pick 4 to 6 photos in JPG format to support your loved ones' life story
- Step 3: Record a eulogy, poem or story using your smartphone, computer or directly within the submission form
- Step 4: Fill out the Griever Participant Form below with all this material and submit it
If you have any issues or doubt please send me an email to soulsonhold@gmail.com