A response to the COVID-19 pandemic, The Artists' Grief Deck is a set of 60 medium format "flashcards" that are individually designed by artists, sometimes in collaboration with grief workers. One side displays an original artwork, created by artists from around the world responding to our open call, and on the reverse is a ‘grieving prompt.’ These are memorial and processual actions that give the individual something to do – a gesture, a tiny performance, a movement, an act of mindfulness – in memoriam for someone or something whose loss they are grieving. As a toolkit, the decks have been disbursed for free to grief workers and community organizations.

My submission to this project was inspired by my yia yia's passing over a decade ago. I think about her sometimes - and all of the specific memories I have compartmentalized in my brain from visiting her in her last few months as she was gravely ill - and often wonder what she would think of me if she were still here. She never got to watch me through high school and college, and could probably never fathom all of the changes I have cycled through as I started discovering my identity as a queer trans person. I am totally different now, and maybe that would be okay with her, but it is all a part of the complicated, years-long process of grieving.

the deck will be distributed by princeton architectural press in the fall of 2022, and is viewable for free at griefdeck.com.