Today we have another set of photos from Purplepeanut. This time, from the Laclede's Landing Wax Museum. I honestly had never heard of this place until he told me about. it But with great scenes like this one, the museum looks worth visiting.
From the wax museum at Laclede's Landing in St. Louis, Missouri (June 2008), comes a scene guaranteed to freeze your bones. (Heh heh heh ...) In the fall of 1888, "Jack the Ripper" terrorized London, butchering five (possibly six) prostitutes "most 'orribly" in the squalid East End of the city. This scene recreates one of the killer's crimes in the museum's "basement of horrors".
Referred to in this scene as the "London Ripper", he is shown about to wrap his arm around an intended victim. This tableau relies rather heavily on fantasy -- the few descriptions of the Ripper we have are hardly reliable, so who knows what he actually looked like? Here, he vaguely resembles actor John Cusack with a bloodshot eye. His female prey seems to be a generic prostitute, as she resembles none of "Saucy Jack's" actual victims.
The Ripper legend is so deeply carved into our unconscious, however, that the scene is still quite eerie. The Laclede's Landing museum may not be a match for Tussaud's in terms of production values, but the costumes and set are quite appropriate here.
A snapshot of the scene in its regular lighting. Note the pipes above -- another clue that we're in the building's basement (an appropriate place for horror, from a Jungian point of view).Photos and text courtesy of Purplepeanut
Thanks again Purplepeanut! I enjoy Jack's illusion of motion. They did a good job making him look like he is just about to strangle that poor woman, and not some statue standing awkwardly with it's hand out.
Tags: Laclede's Landing Wax Museum Wax Jack the Ripper
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