Mannequin Rising
Nikkei National Museum
by Roy Miki
Mannequin Rising is the fifth book of poetry from the Governor-General's Award winner Roy Miki, his first since 2006's There. In Mannequin Rising, Miki describes a world of consumerism, and answers the visual cacophony of commodities and window displays with a series of poems and photomontages that reflect the uncanny juxtapositioning he sees all around him. The centrepiece of Mannequin Rising is a triptych of poem sequences, "Scoping (also pronounced Shopping) in Kits," "A Walk on Granville Island," and "Viral Travels in Tokyo," where Miki closely observes three different neighbourhoods and their mannequins / mannikins / manakins / manikins, almost alien yet familiar beings inhabiting and altering relationships between nature and culture.
Mannequin Rising is the fifth book of poetry from the Governor-General's Award winner Roy Miki, his first since 2006's There. In Mannequin Rising, Miki describes a world of consumerism, and answers the visual cacophony of commodities and window displays with a series of poems and photomontages that reflect the uncanny juxtapositioning he sees all around him. The centrepiece of Mannequin Rising is a triptych of poem sequences, "Scoping (also pronounced Shopping) in Kits," "A Walk on Granville Island," and "Viral Travels in Tokyo," where Miki closely observes three different neighbourhoods and their mannequins / mannikins / manakins / manikins, almost alien yet familiar beings inhabiting and altering relationships between nature and culture.