Previous posts have focused mainly on the use of mannequins in shop displays and to a lesser extent as aids for artists. They also have role in museum and heritage displays.
Since the opening of the Jorvik Viking Centre in York in 1984 ‘museums’ in the UK have sought to create realistic displays of how life was lived in the past – more or less lifelike tableaux have increasingly replaced cabinets of objects. (There may well be a much longer history to this than I am aware of).
The figures aim for a real presence, unlike the smooth perfection of the retail mannequin. This is easier said than done. In shop windows the figures have to do no more that stand or sit as elegant clotheshorses; museum figures may achieve a sub-Meuck reality of wrinkles and whiskers, but achieving convincing stances can be tricky, as the picture of the fisherman shows.
Photos: Cromer Museum