CONSTRUCTED REALITY: THE DIORAMA AS ART
CONSTRUCTEDREALITY: THEDIORAMA AS ARTDiane Fox explores the encounter - the returned animal gaze that holds the viewer incommunication. But is communication effectively achieved through the naturalistic artifice ofnatural history dioramas?Text by Diane FoxDiane FoxWrapped, Milwaukee Public Museum 13
The term diorama, derived from the Greek “dia”(through) and “orama,” (to see), was first coinedby the French scenic painter, physicist, andinventor of the daguerreotype L.J.M. Daguerre and hisco-worker Charles-Marie Bouton in 1821. (1) It referredto large sheets of transparent fabric painted with realisticimages on both sides that were designed to be viewedfrom a distance through a framing device that hide thepaintings’ vanishing points. When Daguerre’s firstdiorama opened in Paris in July 1822 there were twopaintings, one by Daguerre and the other by Bouton.One showed an interior and the other a landscape.When sunlight was redirected with mirrors and shonethrough the cloth it produced changing effectstransforming day into night, winter into summer, thusheightening its illusion of reality. Though at first thesedioramas consisted only of painted curtains, as theirpopularity waned, Daguerre began to introduce 3dimensional elements into the foreground of the scene, atone time going so far as to add a live goat.(2) This use of3 dimensional elements combined with paintedbackgrounds continued in the form of panoramas andcycloramas, which sprang up in the early 19th century allover Europe. Panoramic paintings showed a “wide, allencompassing view” on a curved surface. Cycloramaswent a step further, totally surrounding the viewer withbuilding sized paintings hung in a circle with threedimensional foregrounds and figures. These were viewedfrom the inside and usually depicted battle scenes.Cycloramas were “making news as popular andeducational forms of entertainment” at the same time asCarl Akeley, working for the Milwaukee Public Museum;created the first known habitat diorama in 1889. (3) Thisdiorama, The Muskrat Group, “was prepared as the firstin a series of groups representing the ‘fur-bearing animalsof Wisconsin. The diorama is still on view today at theMilwaukee Public Museum. (2) Akeley’s total habitatdiorama set the standard for museum exhibit techniquesand became known in museum circles as the "MilwaukeeStyle."(2)Before Carl Akeley’s creation for the MilwaukeePublic Museum, taxidermy was typically arranged in glasscases and mounted on walls. The collection of animals fordisplay dates as far back as the Renaissance. Thesecollections displayed the collected objects of aristocratswho were among the few with means to travel. (2) Manyof these types of displays exist to this day. In 2005 I hadthe opportunity to photograph at the Specola Museum inFlorence, Italy. This natural history museum founded bythe Medici family in 1774 had a similar purpose to laternatural history museums in that its function was toeducate scientists, physicians and the public to thewonders of nature. Though most well known for itscollection of anatomic waxes, it also served to house theMedici’s collection of natural curiosities, fossils, plants andanimals.There were a few exceptions to this type ofdisplay that may be considered forerunners of Akeley’stotal habitat dioramas. British taxidermist, Walter Potter,was creating scenes of anthropomorphized animalsengaged in human activity for his Bramber Museum in1880. Entertaining “Dime Museums” featured livingpeople posed in front of painted scenery. (3) CharlesWilson Peale, an artist and early pioneer in taxidermyand museum display, created America’s first naturalhistory museum in 1786 in Philadelphia. His displays wereunusual, as he tried to “accurately re-create living creatureswith his art and painted skies and landscapes on the backs ofthe cases displaying his taxidermy specimens.” (2) Thecollection disappeared from public view when it was soldin 1846.However, it is Akeley who is credited as thefather of the total habitat diorama and for makingtaxidermy into an art form. Prior to Akeley’s methods, ofmounting animals, their skins were simply stuffed with avariety of materials, most often wood or straw shavings.Akeley’s method, still used to mount specimens today,was rigorous and precise, beginning with photos,drawings, anatomical casts and detailed measurements ofthe animal taken in the field. When back at the museum,a rough armature was made, using the animal’s real skulland bones. The body of the animal was then modelled inclay onto the armature, using the field measurements, thebody casts and photography. From this carefully craftedsculpture, a plaster cast was made and coated with warmglue. Strips of muslin were laid onto the glue and carefullyworked into the mold. Thin layers of paper-mache withwire cast reinforcement were worked into the mold andshellacked to make it impervious to water. The wholepiece was then immersed in water, melting the glue sothat the cast could be easily lifted from the mold. It wasonly then that the skin of the animal was mounted ontothe completed substrate. (2) It is interesting to considerthe amount of craft and skill that goes into each of theanimals within a habitat diorama. As museum taxidermistDavid Schwendeman says “As long as we work in clay, it’sart,” “But once we cover our work with a skin it becomesmere taxidermy.”(2)Akeley left the Public Museum soon after creatingThe Muskrat Group and brought his methods and talentfirst to Chicago’s Field Museum and later to New York’sAmerican Museum of Natural History. (*) An avidconservationist and naturalist, Akeley worked toconserve the environments to which he travelled bybringing knowledge of them to the public through hisdioramas. His greatest passion was for the wildlife ofAfrica and the Akeley Hall of African Mammals in NewYork stands today as a testament to this fact.14
Diane FoxCarnegie Museum of Natural History, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, (Rocky Mountain Elk) 2001 Another artist, who had a great affect on the beauty andcraft of the habitat diorama, is J. Perry Wilson whoworked with Akeley at the American Museum from 1934-1957. One of the most respected diorama painters,Wilson devised a system of transferring the backgroundimage of the diorama onto its curved surface to minimizethe amount of distortion of perspective. A successfuldiorama must be able to be viewed from the height of achild as well as an adult. If the horizon line is placed toohigh, the horizon appears to go up on each end, if toolow, it appears to go down. (3)Wilson’s method used amathematical formula to transfer the background imageonto a curved grid based on the optimum viewpoint.Wilson described his work with the Latin phrase, arscelare artum, or “art to conceal art.” (2)The experience of the diorama places theaudience into a moment within nature. It is a discovery,an adventure, a glimpse within a realm of existence ofwhich we are rarely a part. The more beautifully craftedthe diorama, the more heightened its sense of reality, thegreater connection the observer has to the liferepresented within the frame. If we, who can observenature closely by flipping to the Nature Channel can lookat these dioramas with amazement, imagine the affectthey had on an audience new to viewing worlds outsidetheir immediate surroundings and to the invention ofphotography itself.Since the 19th Century, “diorama” has come tomean “a miniature or full-sized model environment inwhich figures, stuffed wildlife or other objects arearranged in a naturalistic setting with a paintedbackground.” As such, dioramas could be regarded as aform of installation art, as they combine physical featuresarranged in a real space with painted or photographicillusions of an even deeper space.Contemporary artists have taken the form of thediorama a step further, constructing imaginary spaces andfictional situations. While the originators of the dioramastrove to heighten its sense of reality, manycontemporary artists have used the medium’s format to15
Diane FoxAmerican Museum of Natural History, New York, New York, (Ostrich) 2000 comment on its artificiality or hyper reality.My interest in photographing dioramas grew froman image I took on vacation in Ann Arbor. While visitingthe Exhibit Museum of Natural History at the Universityof Michigan, I came across a small, strange diorama in arounded case. This diorama showed an underwater viewof a pond. What drew my eye was how poorly it wasconstructed. The plastic at the top, representing thesurface of the water was bent and a harsh light shonethrough it. A plastic looking frog was stuck up into thewater’s surface, its head obscured from view, its legsdangling. I took the shot, thinking the image would showme what my eyes were seeing, but a much different imageresulted. This photograph transformed the imperfectlymodelled diorama into a magical underwater space. Myinterest was piqued and when I next had the opportunityto photograph in a natural history museum, this time atthe State Park in Morrow Bay, California, I engaged thedioramas with much more concentrated focus. Onceagain I was surprised, both by the seamless transitionbetween the foreground elements and the paintedbackground and by the hint of life seen in the taxidermy.There is an obvious disconnect between theexperience represented within a diorama’s case and itsreality. I became more aware of this dichotomy thelonger I trained my eye on various dioramas. It was thelines between the real and the unreal; the version of lifeportrayed and the actuality of death; the inherent beautyof the animals within their fabricated environment andthe understanding of its invention; that first found meboth attracted and repelled.What happened as I continued to photograph,was that both my interest in and respect for the dioramasbegan to broaden, as I made more discoveries throughthe lens. It is these growing interests that lead me tobegin researching the diorama’s history and grew into anappreciation for both its craft and its mission.I am of course, not the first photographer totrain their eye on the diorama. The most well knownartist to do so is the Japanese photographer, Hiroshi16
Richard RossAmerican Museum of Natural History, Sugimoto. When he first arrived in the New York in1974, Sugimoto visited the American Museum of NaturalHistory. Sugimoto relates, “I made a curious discoverywhile looking at the exhibition of animal dioramas: thestuffed animals positioned before painted backdropslooked utterly fake, yet by taking a quick peek with oneeye closed, all perspective vanished, and suddenly theylooked very real. I had found a way to see the world as acamera does. However fake the subject, oncephotographed, it's as good as real.” (4) For the hauntingbody of work that followed, “Diorama,” Sugimoto used alarge format camera. The complete clarity of the imageworked to both transform the diorama into a convincingrepresentation of reality and to reveal its artificiality. Inthe mid-seventies, Richard Ross photographed withinvarious natural history museums for his body of work,Museology. Many of Ross’s photographs approach thenatural history museum in a very different way, clearlyshowing us disparate edges and the fabrication of theanimals positioned within the frame. Ross states, “I wasnew to photography but understood the practice to bean illusion of space and time, rather than reality.or acertain reality. When I stood in front of a diorama,created by Ackley, the idea was pretty similar. Thediorama itself was an illusion of space and time. Whenthe two merged, in panoramic format, and thingsflattened, it was difficult to see the illusion and there wasa different level of credibility that I could control bymoving in or out from the scenario. I also was interestedin the glass as a transparent membrane. On one side wasreality, on the other illusion, similar to how we view TV.We don't describe ‘I saw a TV show about nurses anddoctors".rather "I saw Greys Anatomy last night.’ Themembrane is taken away and people refer to the showsas reality. In the dioramas we are more conscious of it. Itcomes down to how omnipotent we can be when we seethe animals in proximate space and leave themundisturbed. The successful illusions are so fantastic,because they make us invisible gods.”Another contemporary photographer, GregoryCrewdson, constructs his own large-scale dioramas tocreate psychologically haunting images. Where Sugimotostrives to breath life into the taxidermied animals,Crewdson’s living inhabitants appear more dead thanalive. They present a narrative which comments onsuburbia, showing his audience a familiar place nowtransformed and unsafe. (5) Foxes and other animals walkthe streets or lurk outside your door. A woman floatslifeless within her living room. These images “draw ourattention to acts of both looking in and being watched,”placing us in a venerable relationship with nature. (5)Another artist, Harri Kallio explored thehypothetical and the real in his body of work, “The Dodoand Mauritius Island.” He first constructed museumquality fabrications of the extinct dodo bird based on thescientific literature, bones, and paintings. (6) The birdswere then photographed in their last known habitat,Mauritius Island, further enriching the illusion.Each of these examples offers evidence of thesignificance of working within a series. With eachsituation there are new discoveries and knowledge thatyou can bring to the images that follow. The nextopportunity for me to photograph within a naturalhistory museum took place when I came to the American17
Gregory CrewdsonUntitled, 1998 Museum of Natural History in New York in 2000. Thebeauty of the Akeley’s dioramas mesmerized me andseveral of my photographs from that shoot simply reflectthe elegance of the displays through my reframing of thediorama through the lens. It was not until I turned acorner within the museum and that saw this reflection ofa gorilla and human skeleton on the glass of thechimpanzee’s case, that I came to a new way to realizemy own vision for the work. Not only did the reflectionextend the meaning of the image, but also thechimpanzee’s concentrated gaze into the camera’s lensbreathed life into its taxidermied body. Another imagefrom that shoot is of this desperate looking weaselsurrounded by his or her obviously deceased brethren.Through her worried gaze she seems to ask, “Will I benext?”I have had the opportunity over the past fewyears to photograph in several museums in the US as wellas abroad. I have made it a point to visit all the museumsthat include Carl Akeley’s dioramas, The Field Museum inChicago, the American Museum and the MilwaukeeMuseum, which I had an opportunity to revisit this pastyear.With each new museum I have an opportunityfor discovery. What will I choose to include or excludefrom the photograph? This image from the MilwaukeePublic Museum excludes the three dimensional warriorfigures from the rest of the diorama and forces us tomeet the eyes of the attacking painted tribesmen. Thefact that the tribesmen are obviously painted gives theaudience an immediate clue into its unreality. Aphotograph shot from the left edge of the same dioramashows a very different view of the scene, placing theaudience into the position of a warrior facing a charginglion. This image from the Bremen Museum in BremenGermany also establishes a relationship between thepainted background and the taxidermied buffalo, withonly a hint of a spear’s point on the right to let theviewer know another attacker lies beyond the frame. Inthis photograph from Chicago’s Field Museum, thecamera’s low point of view brings us dangerously close tobeing trampled.Point of view must also be considered inrelationship to the animal’s gaze. The more directly theanimal looks into the eye of the viewer, the more alivethey become. This can give us a warm feeling at first, as inthe shot of these donkeys or make us immediatelyalarmed as when we are confronted with this screaming18
Diane FoxMuseo Civico di Zoologia, (detail) Roma, Italy 2001 between the diorama and what is reflected on its glass. Ifind the discovery of reflections compelling, as they pushbeyond a reframing of the constructed scene to thecreation of a new image entirely. This image of zebrasfrom the Carnegie Museum in Pitts. shows a slice ofmuch larger diorama. The reflection was created becauseof the turn of the glass case. In this image from theBremen Museum, the animal on the left of the framegazing at the winter foxes is merely a reflection fromanother case. These ducks, from the Field Museum, gazein on themselves, while this gazelle from Bremen racingto escape its aggressor, prepares to leap a reflectedfence.The photographer, Baldwin Lee, once told methat every photograph has a size in which it works best.When contemplating how to display these images, Ithought about that statement and decided that theseparticular photographs needed to be large. How elsecould to viewer truly confront the animals within theirdisplays? The larger the animals were within the image,the more life seemed to emerge from their stuffedbodies. In the case of these mice shot in Museo Civico diZoologia in Rome, Italy, though, the scale was surprisingin another way, since the mice actually became largerDiane FoxAmerican Museum of Natural History, New York, New York,(Chimpanzees) 2000 money or placed in the path of these stampeding buffalo.Either way, we are eventually brought to the reality oftheir lifelessness.While the majority of time I have worked toheighten the illusion of reality, at least at first glance, atother times I have chosen to divulge more information,revealing aspects of the museum’s constructedenvironment. When the photograph can create a tensionbetween an illusionary, naturalistic space and its reality asan artificial construction, it is able to employ what I findso compelling about the natural history diorama.Although I still view the chimpanzee image fromthe American Museum as my most surprising reflection, Iam always looking for the relationships I can draw19
than life. Reinforcing the concept further lead me to printall the images the same size, 23.5 x 35 and to frame themwithout a mat in shadow box frames with small brassplaques engraved with the name of the museum and itslocation. When displayed in a gallery, the frames mimicthe experience of viewing the cases within the naturalhistory museum.Though I have photographed within naturalhistory museums for several years, my interest in themcontinues to grow and expand. I began this process notrealizing the complexity of the artistic vision and craft ofthe diorama artists, nor understanding that their missionwas to enhance our understanding of and appreciationfor nature in order to move us to conserve its life andbeauty. Certainly in this day and time that is an importantmessage to hear.1 T. Kamps, Small Worlds: Dioramas in Contemporary Art, Museumof Contemporary Art San Diego pp. 6-112 S. Christopher Quinn Windows on Nature: The Great HabitatDioramas of the American Museum of Natural History, HabitatDiorama Art in the Service of Science, (Abrams, NY in association withthe American Museum of Natural History, 2006) pp. 8-233 The Milwaukee Style: Dioramas and the Milwaukee Museum4-8 H. Sugimoto, “Dioramas,” www.sugimotohiroshi.com, 20055 P. Hall, “Gardening at Night” Print Magazine: Vol.57 Issue 4,(Jul/Aug2003), pp.41-496 H. Kallio, The Dodo and Maritius Island: Imaginary Encounter,(Dewi Lewis Publishing 2004) pp. 49-687 S. Davis, “Cyclorama,” The New Georgia le.jsp?id h-825&hl y8 R. Derek Wood, The Diorama in Great Britain in the 1820s in thequarterly journal History of Photography, Vol 17, #3 (Autumn 1993)pp. 284-295Diane Fox is an Instructor in the College of Architecture andDesign at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville where sheteaches graphic design and photography. Fox received herMFA degree from The University of Tennessee in1992 and herBFA degree from Middle Tennessee State University in 1986.Her current body of photographic work, "UnNatural History",is composed of images shot in various natural history museumsin the US and Europe. Her work has been exhibited in the ErieArt Museum, Erie, PA; Tower Fine Arts Gallery, SUNYBrockport, Brockport, NY; Santa Reparata Gallery, FlorenceItaly; Apex Gallery, South Dakota School of Mines andTechnology, Rapid City, SD; Erie Museum of Art, Erie, PA;Santa Reparata Galleria, Florence, Italy; Sarratt Gallery,Vanderbilt University Nashville, TN; and Dom Muz Gallery,Torun, Poland.20
created the first known habitat diorama in 1889. (3) This diorama, The Muskrat Group, “was prepared as the first in a series of groups representing the ‘fur-bearing animals of Wisconsin. The diorama is still on view today at the Milwaukee Public Museum. (2) Akeley’s total habitat diorama set the standard for museum exhibit techniques
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Rainforest Habitat Diorama Learn all about tropical rainforests and the animals that live in this habitat by making this exciting shoebox diorama. These are trees to be placed at the corners of the box. Cut a long rectangle from bro
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