Aesthetic and political dimensions of the habitat diorama around 1900. Agency and medial obstinacy in museums of natural history

• Applicant: Theresa Stankoweit
• Subject Area: Art History
• Term: since 2024
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 536375452

Topic of this publication is the habitat diorama, a natural history display in which taxidermically prepared animals are presented in a designed landscape against a painted background. It thus brings into focus a visual medium that, despite its widespread use, has remained largely unnoticed in previous art historical research. The core thesis of the book is that through the use of a specific media dispositive, that aims at a physical aesthetic experience, particularly powerful ideological image statements are made in habitat dioramas. Main examples are two displays from the Senckenberg Museum in Frankfurt am Main: the "Flora and Fauna Deutsch- Ostafrikas" ("Flora and Fauna of German East Africa", 1908) and the "Nordpolarleben" ("North Polar Live", 1912). Based on the Frankfurt examples, the first half of the paper analyses the political dimensions of the habitat diorama. It is shown that stereotypical gender roles and ideal-typical life concepts are communicated through the way in which the mounted animals are manufactured and compilated. The "Lebensraum" presented in the Habitat diorama is a political category; in Frankfurt's Museum of Natural History, colonial territory is marked, colonization is imaginatively reenacted. The popularization of the natural sciences, especially biology, which as the "Lehre des Lebens (teaching of life)" points beyond the established discipline, is identified as the context of the establishment of habitat dioramas in the newly emerging natural history museums. Connections to nature conservation movements and hunting are shown. The second half of the paper examines the aesthetic dimensions of the habitat diorama. The presence of animal skin, as well as the illusion of liveliness inherent in the taxidermy, creates a powerful material and indexical authentication of the image’s content. This is underlined by the individual bodily experience that the medium encourages. The three-dimensionality and spatial depth of the staged image demand movement in front of the picture. The different material surfaces and spatial staggering of the pictorial elements address a tactile and bodily perception. Comparisons with animal photographs, zoological illustrations and the presentation of living animals in zoological gardens, as well as with other popular visual media of the time, such as the panorama or stereoscopic photography, highlight the specific medial characteristics of the habitat diorama. After a passage reflecting on the medial status of the photographs of habitat dioramas - which form the basis of the whole analysis - the work concludes with an outlook: Due to the current ecological crises, new stagings of nature will emerge in natural history museums. These, like the historical examples, should be questioned with regard to their aesthetic strategies as well as to their cultural and political dimensions.

• DFG Programme: Publication Grants