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Photo Essay | Père Lachaise | Paris

by | Dec 22, 2012 | Photo Essay

You might think its a bit weird but I’ve been doing this for years.

Père Lachaise – Paris

I’ve done it in Holister and Oceano California, New Orleans and Paris. The older the better! Wherever I travel to I always seek out the oldest possible cemetery to explore and photograph. Its the history and art in cemeteries that dates back more than century that appeals to me. The world we live in today is made mostly of plastic. Old cemeteries date baak to an age of craft when things were made by atrisans with hand made tools. I see graveyards and cemeteries are living monuments. Handcut stone carvings, chiseled sculptures, hand-wrought iron work, painstaking handcrafted, leaded, stain glass that dates back 200 years…its these wonderfully beautiful monuments that continue to live on. On my lastest trip to Paris I visited Père Lachaise, resting place of Jim Morrison, Honoré de Balzac, Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Honoré Daumier, Jacques-Louis David and hundreds of other famed painters, poets, statesman, architects and sculptors.
 
metro stop Pere Lachaise, Paris, picture

The Pere Lachaise metro stop, Paris

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In the Jewish culture, visitors put grass and pebbles on the grave to show that the visitor was at the grave. It was a sort of calling card to tell the deceased that you have paid him a visit.

family tomb, pere lachaise cemetery, paris, picturetomb interior, pere lachaise cemetery, paris, picture

Tomb interior.

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Remnants of a prayer chair and remains of a death bust an homage to a family member.

fall, pere lachaise cemetery, paris, pictureDeath bust, pere lachaise cemetery, paris, picture

Death bust, mausoleum interior.

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Stained glass dating back 200 years

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Looking through a cross aperture in the mausoleum door.

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Light passing through a stained glass window and raking on the wall. Photographed through the wrought iron door of the mausoleum.

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150 year old iron work, mausoleum doors, Pere Lachaise.

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Each mausoleum door a work of art, Pere Lachaise.

Photographed exclusively with the Olympus OMD EM5.