Lagoonscapes

The Venice Journal of Environmental Humanities

Mourning the Mounted: An Analysis of the Taxidermy Exhibition Dead Animals with a Story

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Abstract

This article analyzes the taxidermy exhibition Dead Animals with a Story located in the Natural History Museum of Rotterdam in order to discover the subversive potentiality of taxidermy. Through granting the taxidermy animals subjectivity, by recognizing human and non-human kinship, and by creating accountability towards animal suffering, Dead Animals with a Story sets the stage for the animals to be deemed grievable. This points to the potential of the exhibition to reshape pre-established social and cultural boundaries between the human and the animal, which becomes ever so important in a world marked by extinction and loss.


Open access | Peer reviewed

Submitted: June 23, 2024 | Accepted: July 27, 2024 | Published Dec. 6, 2024 | Language: en

Keywords Human-animal relationship • Taxidermy • Animal Studies • New taxidermy • Mourning

Copyright © 2024 Robin Jiskoot . This is an open-access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction is permitted, provided that the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. The license allows for commercial use. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

Permalink http://doi.org/10.30687/LGSP/2785-2709/2024/02/009