There is an uncanniness with mannequins and female bodies. You may assume that the uncanniness lays with the mannequins, my argument suggests otherwise. The true uncanniness is with the real living female body.
Uncanny is describes as the psychological feeling of something creepy/eerie, something that was once know to us. The familiarity between what you know and what you think you know. The mannequin was create in the 15th century. The creation of the mannequin was to enhance the fashion industry, where they were to assist in the demonstration of fashion to customers. Mannequins were to reflect the female body. When you think of a mannequin you think of a pale thin plastic female body. With that said, why do people insist that a living female body must look like the unalive intimate object, the mannequin. Because of this all-encompassing thing the living female body gets devalued as what is true. Because of this the once familiar aspect is unknown. Instead, the true familiarity is with the mannequin, or rather an intangible image that most females can’t achieve. Not so much a mannequin but what the mannequin looks like. Now that the living female body is degraded, they are seen as something that isn’t real. This then adds creepiness and eeriness creating the uncanny experience.
These words resembling how that particular body is views. On the top the living body has the words. Grotesque: comically or repulsively ugly or distorted. Monstrous: having ugly or freighting appearance. Jarring: feeling chocked or appalled. Preternatural: beyond what is normal or natural. The image on the bottom the thing. Natural: in agreement with the characters or makeup of, or circumstances surrounding someone or something. Innate: existing in, belonging to, or determined by factors presented in an individual from birth. Standard: an idea or thing used as a measure, norm, or model in comparative evaluations.
The body outline is to resemble which body is the thing. In the smaller, paler, thinner body you can see how the lines are not connected. Opposed to the outline of the bigger and darker body, where the outline connects. The unconnected line is to represent how that body is the thing. The body doesn’t flow naturally. Where as the larger body does. The larger body is to represent the human in this scenario.
The background in the illustration shows an array of symbols in a mix of colors. Starting at the right there are full squiggly lines and characters that lead into straighter lines as you move to the left until there is just straight coherent lines. Broken up into three parts the beginning phase, the middle phase, and the final phase. These phases represent the uncanny experience. How something that was once there and familiar morphed into something not what you are use to seeing. How it happened over time. Just like with the female body. The conclusiveness of the female body isn’t as definitive as once before.
The colors representing femininity.
As a result of this project I have produced an argument based on Unit 2 of my Doppelgangers and Doubles expository class. The idea of the uncanny as shown by Sigmund Freud. One popular way that was shown in unit 2 to express uncanniness was through fashion mannequins. How they are eerie because of how similar they are to the human body. So much so that it is creepy. My argument based with that initial idea, but to dive deeper and to show how the opposite can be shown. How the human body, more particularly the female body, shows the uncanniness.
