The Mannequin Gallery

When I started searching online for mannequins I could buy, I came across a website for The Mannequin Gallery in Pacoima. This is a rental house that specializes solely in mannequins. I liked the idea of going to a warehouse full of mannequins to do my casting call.

The Mannequin Gallery is run by husband and wife team Walt Wilkey and Shelley Freeman. Walt, the founder and chief artist, repairs, repaints, refurbishes and custom creates mannequins. Shelley, who runs the business side, has an encyclopedic knowledge of mannequins. When giving a tour of the warehouse she’ll stop at any given mannequin and tell you the year, country and style they were manufactured as well as their cup size and what job they were last rented for. Her enthusiasm is infectious.

As Shelley led me through the crowded rows of human imposters she asked me if I wanted to check out the mannequin graveyard. My eyes instantly lit up and she had me follow her upstairs to the jumbled pile of body parts.

I made a mental note to come back and rent some limbs for future shoots, and climbed back down the stairs to continue the search for my muse.

I turned the corner at a busty brunette and that’s when I saw her.

http://www.mannequingallery.com

Why the mannequin?

When showing my recent series of photos people often ask me “Why the mannequin?” I usually say it has to do with my fear of living models, which is only partially true.  The original idea was to shoot long exposure portraits and to use different lighting instruments to “paint” light on and around the subject. Here were some tests I did on myself:

Multi-colored light wand

Glow stick

Glow stick spinning in power drill

Fiber optic light wand

Fiber optic light wand

After doing these tests I was thinking how I could get someone to stand still for 10-30 seconds at a time while I “painted” the light around them. That’s when I decided I would use a mannequin.