Altars

Mrs. Jones left me an old, broken laptop before she resigned. She suggested me to use that piece of junk (may you rest in peace, 10-year-old computer) for my concentration. After seeing its potential to arrange in a composition with several useless picture frames, I almost immediately thought, "I could make a altar/altarpiece!"
I must have gotten a little into the idea of altars after seeing so many in AP Art History. I'm not religious, my family is not that religious, and I don't even see altars that often in real life, not staring at one everyday, at least. Still, I do find altars interesting. It's an universal thing. Everywhere you see altars of different shapes and sizes and religions, yet they all share a similar purpose.
Is it too much a criticism, or a praise, to say technology is our new religion? Maybe people like me don't necessarily worship our computers, but I think in many ways technology dictates our actions like how religion did in earlier times. We ask the computer questions, and it gives us answers. However I feel like the idea is rather satirical and shouldn't be taken too seriously.

The most common altar you see in homes in Taiwan is probably something like this.

A small statue, some candles, and fruits.
And in temples you get much more elaborate ones.

Or something in between, to be put in a room but not for mass worship.

I guess this is a Taoist one, but sometimes it's really hard to tell since Buddhism, Taoism, and folklore are all mixed together.

Wiki used this one as an example of Taoist altars.

Here is a Tibetan Buddhist one.

These pictures of Asian altars are all in such shitty quality. Fortunately there are far more pictures of Christian altars and altarpieces.

St. James's Church, Rothenburg ob der Tauber

Altarpiece of Veit Stoss

Michael Pacher St Wolfgang Altarpiece

Some Christian DIY altars.

I searched for Hindu altars, but can't seem to find many pictures. This is a home altar.

I'm dedicating a whole section just for Mexican Day of the Dead altars because they are seriously amazing.

Altar by Laurie Beth Zuckerman. You can see the process here.

An old one.

For a lot of home altars people will use whatever object they could get and it's great.
Lastly, have a Catrina.