Why obituaries
The original plan was to use the comics section. Bright colours, thin paper, easy to source. The first attempt produced a skull that looked like a piñata. This was not the intended effect.
The sports section was tried next. Thicker paper, more ink. Better structure, but the surface was visually chaotic — headlines about football results and doping scandals competing for attention across every curve of the cranium. The skull looked stressed.
The obituary advantage
Obituary pages have a consistent layout. Small photographs. Short text blocks. Even margins. The ink coverage is moderate and uniform — no full-page advertisements, no colour inserts, no pull quotes in 48pt bold. When layered as papier-mâché, the visual texture is subdued. The text is present but not legible at normal viewing distance. It reads as pattern, not information.
The paper stock is also slightly different. Obituary sections in Belgian newspapers use a marginally heavier weight — possibly because the section is handled differently during printing, possibly because someone at the paper mill made a decision decades ago that no one has revisited. Whatever the reason, it produces a firmer structure when layered with adhesive.
The count
Four hundred and twenty-eight obituaries. Collected over approximately three months from local newspapers. Each one cut to size, soaked, and applied by hand. The skull required eleven layers for structural integrity.
People want the number to mean something. They want 428 to be symbolic — a commentary on mortality, or a statement about the disposability of memory. It is not. It is the number of obituaries required to cover a human skull in eleven layers of papier-mâché. The meaning is arithmetic.
On the acoustics of bone
Bone conducts sound differently than wood. This is not a metaphor. It is a measurement. The calvaria resonates at frequencies that cherry wood does not, and vice versa. Together they produce something neither material achieves alone.
Diaphonization notes: temperature sensitivity
The clearing process failed twice before it worked. Both failures were temperature-related. The enzyme that digests soft tissue operates in a narrow thermal window. Outside that window, you get soup.
CRT safety, or: things they should print larger
A flyback transformer stores enough voltage to stop your heart. This information is printed in 6pt type on a label inside the casing, which you can only read after you have already opened the casing. The design philosophy here is unclear.