Materializing the past: mannequins, history and memory in museums. Insights from the Northern European and East-Asian contexts

Abstract

What are the rationale, significance and implications of the use of reproductions of the human body in contemporary historical museums? This article probes this question through a critical analysis of diverse uses of body simulacra – specifically mannequins and life-size figures – in historical museums in Taiwan and China. The discussion of the East-Asian case study is set against examples from historical representations of the body in Northern Europe as a way to offer a comparative perspective that casts light on the uniqueness and similarities among these geo-cultural areas. This material enables me to reflect on the changing and diverse roles of mannequins in historical displays – in Western (North European) and non-Western contexts – ranging from materializations of the national past, its heroes and martyrs, aiming to canonize History as distant and authoritative, to display devices that strive to generate personal understandings of the past through memories and emotions.