Immagine o persona? Edmund Husserl al museo delle cere

This paper addresses the problem of pretence in hyperrealistic representations from a phenomenological point of view, focusing on the contrast between image consciousness and perceptual apprehension. I will show how the paradigmatic example of waxworks gradually became a veritable leitmotif in Husserl’s thought, suitable for symbolising the transformation of an image phenomenon in an ordinary perceptual apprehension furnished with normal belief. What happens when we see mannequins as human beings? How is it that we suddenly realise we are merely dealing with images? And above all: after discovering that we are facing wax figures and not human beings in flesh and blood, can we really say that we were previously wrong?