Last Cigarette is my personal, ambiguous memorial to smoking, something that has given me pleasure and pain, which both attracts and disgusts me, which I sometimes miss but I’m glad to be rid of.
When things are as bad for us as smoking is we should simply give them up, but it’s often neither simple or easy to do. Even though we know it’s necessary to prevent future suffering we continue to avoid the hard choice. Modern life is riddled with examples of this dilemma, of knowing what should be done, or not done, but feeling unable to prioritize the pleasures of the future over the pleasures of the now.
This is true on the personal level but it also applies on a global level. Are fossil fuels, industrial meat production and capitalism so different from the bad habits we each struggle to break? It seems clear that in the years to come there will be many more things we need to “give up” for the sake of the future and I think that doing so will be much easier if we are able to acknowledge and accept the loss wholly, without rose-tinting or demonizing. Nothing is completely bad and we should be able mourn and say good riddance at the same time.
Last Cigarette is presented in a bespoke tabernacle frame made by Northwood Framing and decorated with an individually handmade, hand-painted ceramic butt.
Lighters and cigarette on a metal altar with paper symbols and "incense" smoke.
A shrine with a black frame and gold inner border, featuring a staircase decorated with candles, small flags, and an image of a lung x-ray at the top.
Close-up of a decorative display of lit candles and a cup with a straw, surrounded by small paper flags on a black and gold frame.
A cigarette butt placed on a black surface with ash around it, against a white wall background.
A framed painting of an underground scene with candles, flags, and a silver platter in a black and gold border
A human hand with a cigarette-shaped object on the palm, made of paper and orange-colored material, resembling a lit cigarette, with a small pile of ash and a burned end.
A human hand holding a toothpick with a miniature model of a stubbed-out cigarette butt.
Red disposable lighters arranged on a wooden surface with one lighter ignited, flames burning. Extra lighters lined up in the background and several metal hooks lying on the table.
A clear plastic bag filled with burnt cigarette filters on a wooden surface.
Black metal staircase with guardrails leading up to a brick building with arched windows and a circular window, under a partly cloudy sky.
X-ray of a human chest hanging on a clothesline outdoors with green bushes and a wooden fence in the background
Colorful bunting, ribbons, a glue stick, a metal ruler, and a white spool on a wooden table.