How We Artistically Pursue Cheap Immortality

One thing we love about the commissions created on ArtCorgi is the manner in which they immortalize their subjects.

When you think of how relatively inexpensive original art commissions are, they’re quite a steal when compared to other means by which people attempt to achieve immortality (e.g. cryogenics, large expeditions to the Fountain of Youth, and extensive medication and surgery).

I spent some time thinking about the top means by which the budget conscious can achieve immortality:

• Art: Duh! If the woman portrayed in the Mona Lisa isn’t in some respects immortal, I don’t know who is. Plenty of people have commissioned art through ArtCorgi already that is clearly, to some extent, meant to immortalize its subjects or a fleeting moment. These folks are in good company. Pictured above is a painting of Eleonora di Toledo, a Medici and patroness of the arts. She, along with many fellow Medicis, immortalized themselves by being painted into famous works of art that are viewed by thousands of people every day.
• Literature: A great way to “possess” the minds of future generations to come is by writing great books that capture their attention and imagination.
• Music: Songs that get sung again and again keep their creators’ and subjects’ memories alive.
• Poetry: Poetry, be it a romantic sonnet or an epic poem like Homer’s Odyssey keeps its characters’ stories alive long after their physical bodies have turned to dust.
• Animation: One needn’t be written into a poem or song to live on- in a recent interview on NPR, Animator Nancy Beiman described the parodies animators make of each other in their work as “cheap immortality”.

I also wrote a bit more about the subject over on HuffPo. But what do you think? Are there other artistic ways people are immortalizing themselves these days? And what are you doing to make sure you live forever? Chat with us about it on Twitter, Tumblr, and Facebook.

Image: A portrait of Eleonora di Toledo made in 1543 by Agnolo Bronzino [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons