Mannequins in European windows are not mere merchandise stands; they can reflect European history and culture to a certain extent.
In the anatomical theatres of Renaissance Florence, publicly dissected corpses were juxtaposed with Greek sculptures from the Medici family's collection, and this morbid fascination with precise human structure is directly projected onto contemporary European mannequins. The torso of a 1960s mannequin from the collection of the Polimoda Academy in Milan has a sternocleidomastoid muscle pattern that is identical to page 13 of Leonardo da Vinci's Anatomical Manuscripts. Wrist of a window mannequin from Amsterdam's Red Light District, the blue resin veins refer to the distribution of veins in the cadaver in Rembrandt's Anatomy Lessons of Professor Dupuy.
The golden statue of the Muse in the Secessionist architecture of Vienna still has some connection with today's window mannequins. The Düsseldorf window mannequins have a waist-to-hip ratio of 0.68, which is only 0.02 off from Rubens' Three Beauties. The 15-degree neck tilt of the mannequin in the Illum department store in Copenhagen mimics the mermaid princess looking up at the humans in Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale. The feet of the mannequins in the high heel section of Harrods in London refer to the skeletal deformation curve of the 19th century corseted lady on X-ray.
From wooden mannequins wearing Bavarian leather trousers in the Oktoberfest tent in Munich to organic mannequins with real mycelium growing in the laboratories of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp, Europe has always staged metamorphoses of the body in its windows. These soul-draining bodies are both puppets of merchandise and mirrors of civilisation, reflecting the Western world's eternal struggle between the sacred and the secular, between freedom and discipline.
When you see female mannequin torso with arms, female mannequin head with shoulders, female mannequin torso with head on the windows of Europe, have you ever wondered about the cultural history behind it?