The Lifespan Project

May 1, 2024 – August 31, 2024

What does it mean to put an endpoint to what is lived, loved, built, eaten, worn, and consumed? The Lifespan Project interrogates the concept of lifespan in all things material and immaterial, as it looks at the used, the expired, and the useless as something other than the end of a life cycle. Through an interdisciplinary approach blending architecture, literary and cultural studies, and race and gender studies, the team examines individual salvaging practices through the combined lens of degradation (environmental, consumerism), vulnerability (human and nonhuman), and grief (personal). While Waste Studies explores discarding from a systemic perspective, the team foregrounds individual practices of care and resistance through repurposing, repair, mending, and restoring.

The team plans to create an exhibit and a triptych short film revolving around salvaged objects, thrifting, vernacular architecture, food waste, and generative possibilities that emerge from erosion and expiration.

The Lifespan Project is Led by Benedicte Boisseron, Professor of Afroamerican & African Studies and Romance Languages & Literature.

Image: Elana Herzog, Civilization and its Discontents, installation view, Herbert F. Johnson Museum, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, 2005.