Nadine Jarvis’s Carbon Copies – Memorial Pencils Made from The Departed

As far as concepts go I have to say that few have struck me as being quite as poetic as Nadine Jarvis’s Carbon Copies which basically consists of a box of pencils made from the carbon of human ‘cremains’ (which, apparently, results in around 240 pencils for what we assume to be an average adult body).

In Jarvis’s own words, ‘Each pencil is foil stamped with the name of the person. Only one pencil can be removed at a time, it is then sharpened back into the box causing the sharpenings to occupy the space of the used pencils. Over time the pencil box fills with sharpenings - a new ash, transforming it into an urn. The window acts as a timeline, showing you the amount of pencils left as time goes by.’

Nadine Jarvis

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