Six young people died in a shooting spree in Seattle one Saturday morning in March 2006.  As a tribute to their memories, a twenty-five-foot-high pagoda was erected and displayed at Seattle Center in August of that year.  Hundreds of viewers added personal notes, photographs and art to the pagoda to acknowledge the deaths.  On Sunday morning, September 3, 2006, the pagoda was lit and quickly burned at the annual Burning Man gathering in Nevada.

There are numerous examples of art that disappears from sight to commemorate the loss of life.  Funeral ceremonies in many parts of the world involve an action that heightens all the senses of the mourners.  Whether buried or burned, art can frame the memories of a person for the living to hold.

This coffin was commissioned for museum display, not as a vehicle for burial. An American art dealer named Bill Wright traveled to Ghana to replace coffins that were damaged during a 1991 exhibition entitled Africa Explores.  Carpenters usually construct coffins for clients who expect the coffin to be seen for only a short time and then be buried.  Instead of serving the deceased in an African grave, the coffins Bill Wright commissioned are displayed as sculpture in museums. They suggest a different way to acknowledge the accomplishments of a person and mourn their death.

In southern Ghana, coffins are ordered from a workshop when a family member is nearing death.  A proper coffin matches the coffin's image with the status or profession of the person it is made for.  A Mercedes is ordered for a few people as a symbol of their success in business, especially for those with enough money to buy imported luxuries.  Owners of large taxi fleets, wealthy market women and businessmen are likely to be buried in a Mercedes-like coffin for their journey to heaven.  Funerals for people with this type of coffin are often accompanied by Christian services conducted outside the home of the deceased.

When death strikes in Ghana, those who can afford to choose a coffin, organize feasts and hire orchestras whose music helps see off the deceased in style.  Mourning turns to celebration as the coffin is carried to all the places that the deceased would want to say goodbye to.  Praise salutes, blessings, prayers and hymns fill the air as the coffin is taken to a burial site.  This manner of acknowledging death is one of many that involve art. In some communities, a figure memorializing or in honor of the deceased is buried or burned, concluding one phase of the grieving process.  In other communities, a portrait keeps the person's image and memory alive forever.  Certain artists depict death by capturing reactions to its news; others create imaginary visions of its presence.