When my grandmother passed away I went to clear out her house, a sobering experience that raised all sorts of questions. What happens to our belongings when we die? What becomes of all those things, all those keepsakes once we’re no longer there to give them meaning?

In a quest for answers I embarked on the series Waiting Rooms.

Over the course of several months I accompanied a funerals officer on her rounds. Her job was to sort out and dispose of the belongings and affairs of people who die heirless and alone. In home after home I encountered a twilight world of stuff. Stuff proliferating. Stuff spread everywhere. As if all these belongings had, rather than sustaining their owners, ultimately turned on them, hastening their departure from this world.