Clothes for Living & Dying

Clothes for Living and Dying brings together two related photographic projects, exploring the relationship of clothing to social and cultural constructions of identity.

Graduation Dresses is an ongoing project consisting of a series of photographs Kern takes of young women who have recently graduated from secondary schools in Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Their dresses, made by the artist’s mother, are based on images found on the internet and in fashion magazines of celebrities wearing haute couture.

Clothes for Death (Odjeca za Smrt) is another of Kern’s ongoing projects; this one documenting women in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina who prepare clothes in which they wish to be buried. Deeply moved upon hearing about this little known and private custom Kern set out to research it further.

The resulting work intimately engages with the lives of women whose identities have been shaped by turbulent historical, political and cultural currents.