Madame Tussauds

A skilled wax sculptor, Marie Tussaud served as art tutor to Louis XVI's sister until the French Revolution began. During the Reign of Terror, Tussaud made death masks from heads—often those of her friends—freshly severed by the guillotine. She moved to Britain with her collection of wax models, and, in 1835, established a museum that remains a principal tourist attraction, now known as Madame Tussauds. One of its main attractions is the Chamber of Horrors. What did it originally include? More...

Chamber of Horrors originally included the wax figures of the victims of the French Revolution....
In 1994, I visited Madame Tussauds in London, and was greatly impressed by the life-like quality of the figures...

It was the world’s fascination with the gore of the French Revolution that ultimately brought her success. Her collection included an actual working guillotine, the death masks she made for its famous victims and models of the royals, including one of the king wearing his actual coronation outfit. By giving commoners a chance to get up-close glimpses at famous people and the dreadful events that surrounded them, Tussaud not only appealed to her audience’s sense of the fantastic, but also offered the allure of the macabre.

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