The Second Death

By Megan Piunti

There’s a quote that is attributed to the artist Banksy, but the idea goes all the way back to the ancient Egyptians. “They say you die twice. One time when you stop breathing and a second time, a bit later on, when somebody says your name for the last time.” 

I first heard this when I was in high school, and instead of feeling the existential dread that often comes with ideas of death, I felt inspired. I was applying to art schools at the time, and the idea of living on through my creative outlets made me want to leave as many marks of myself in this world as I could. I’ve tried finding the best way to leave these marks in an effort to postpone that second death as long as possible - the most notable methods being writing, design, and painting.

Writing is easy to do. Anyone can pour out their heart in just a few strings of words, creating an extension of themselves that is raw and authentic and has the potential to connect with people. Although it is easily accessible, good writing can be very hard. What’s even harder is getting people to read your writing, whether it’s good or not. There is so much writing out there in the world, so many people with stories to tell, and so much of it is ignored or lost in a sea of content.

After bearing my soul in my college admission essays and beginning classes, I pivoted my efforts to design (specifically, industrial design). This is a field where you can have a huge impact with your work, designing products to be mass produced that people will interact with in their everyday lives. The products you work on aren’t as likely to be ignored or lost as writing might be, but that doesn’t mean they will be appreciated. Most people don’t think about the design decisions that went into the water bottle on their desk or the chair they’re sitting on, let alone who designed it. 

There’s a lot that goes into a product’s development, and products aren’t usually designed by just one person. Between working within practical restraints, collaborating with others, and keeping the end user’s preferences in mind, the designer doesn’t really have full creative control, and they’re certainly not pouring their heart into every toaster or toothbrush they work on.

I have a lot of fun with my job, but I wanted to make marks in a way that is more personal, even if it’s not guaranteed as wide of a reach. I started painting again, which I did a lot of growing up and was my first insight into what it is to create something you’re proud of. I have been enjoying it, but it’s hard to keep that pride alive when the paintings don’t sell.

Painting was supposed to be the answer. It checked all the boxes: it’s personal, I can put meaning into it, it’s not easily ignored, I enjoy it, and I’m good at it. But all those reasons didn’t prevent a stack of canvases from forming in a storage bin in my closet, growing again and again after an unsuccessful art fair or coffee shop exhibition. I started to become less motivated to paint, knowing I would just be adding to the stack.

The stack made me feel sad and defeated. At first, I thought that was because it meant I wasn’t successful, but I’m not painting for money or status. I’m painting to make my marks, to put a part of myself into the world. The stack is a reminder that that part of myself might not have a place in the world, and probably will not be remembered.

That’s a hard thing to face. That younger version of myself who read the quote about dying twice was so confident that she would make something meaningful that would live on long past her. Past me. Now, I have to confront the very likely possibility that I am not good enough or significant enough to extend my life past my death.

This has been at the back of my mind, and I have been clinging on to any praise and validation I can get my hands on to convince myself that younger me was right to be so confident. Tell me I’m good. Tell me I’m special. Tell me that people will care about me and the things that I made.

I look at the artists who are meaningful to me and feel envious. It must be incredible to know that people truly care about what you create. I guess the question is, do they know? Are they still doubtful that their work is meaningful or that they will be remembered? Is there always a bigger hill to climb, constantly trying to feel like we are significant enough?

When you look at someone’s legacy, how do you measure it? By how many connections you make with people, how deep those connections are, or is it as simple as how long you manage to keep your name said?

I recently read a novel by Milan Kundera that explores the idea of a person’s legacy, appropriately titled Immortality. He believes that your legacy, your immortality, is not you. It is an idea that transforms through people’s imperfect memories like a game of telephone and exists separately from yourself. Ultimately, you can never have control over your own immortality, and you shouldn’t really care. After all, you’ll be dead anyway.

Your legacy might not be you, but it does exist because of you, and isn’t that still worth something? And even though we have to forfeit control at some point of how exactly we will be remembered, doesn’t that make it all the more worthwhile to do something about it while we can?

That’s another difficult thing to face: “while we can.” Since none of us know how much time we have, there’s this pressure and weight to create more and more work now so we have something to leave behind that we are proud of in case we don’t see tomorrow. This can be positive and motivating, but at what point are we sacrificing too much from our present lives for this hypothetical future that we won’t even be there to experience? Would it even be worth it? 

Obviously, we can’t ask dead artists if they regret devoting so much of their lives to their craft, so we can never really know. It’s a nice thought to imagine them coming back from the dead or time traveling to see their work in the future and how many people care about it, but that’s all it is - a nice thought. We can never really know these artists or express our appreciation to them. We can just enjoy the marks they made.

Eventually, no one will be remembered, but the goal was never immortality. We know that the second death comes. What is important is that we are intentional with how we spend our time before the first one, and hopefully what we leave behind will be meaningful to others before the second one.