In view of the centrality of the human skull in Vanitas imagery as a recall that time is not endless, the essay presents contemporary artworks in which the skull is central, but each time making its call for memory differently. Marlene Dumas, Jeannette Christensen, Nalini Malani and Maya Watanabe, from different regions and in different media and styles all brought the ancient symbol of the skull back to (aesthetic) life; they revitalized it. They thereby remind us that it is not time that

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... killing, as the saying has it, but that it is people who kill, and not just then, but now.