tableau vivant

American  

[ta-bloh vee-vahn] / ta bloʊ viˈvɑ̃ /

noun

French.

plural

tableaux vivants

1. tableau.

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tableau vivant British  

/ tablo vivɑ̃ /

noun

1. a representation of a scene, painting, sculpture, etc, by a person or group posed silent and motionless

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Etymology

Origin of tableau vivant

Literally, “living picture”

Example Sentences

The typical Harding song is not a legible narrative so much as a tableau vivant, with strange, unknowable characters posed in the middle of a scene that is fully realized if never entirely explained.

From New York Times • Mar. 25, 2022

If that sounds like the way photographs were made during the camera’s 19th century infancy — well, it’s not coincidental that the tableau vivant was birthed and flourished around the same time.

From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 16, 2021

This tableau vivant of corseted dancers encased in seventeenth-century hoopskirts resembles a painting by Velázquez inflected with contemporary haute-couture decadence.

From The New Yorker • Apr. 15, 2019

In one project for Hixson’s course, which focused on socially engaged art, students dressed up to create a tableau vivant, or living picture, re-creating Raphael’s masterpiece “The School of Athens.”

From Washington Post • Mar. 22, 2017

As he lay with his face to the foe, the tableau vivant met his gaze the instant he opened his eyes.

From Red Rooney The Last of the Crew by Ballantyne, R. M. (Robert Michael)