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I think they are supposed to be neutral canvases. Catwalk clothing = art. If I made a sad painting I wouldn't want the model/canvas to suddenly smile at their own whim.
I've also heard that the Uber rich have people pouring over them and yes manning them as a baseline, so having models act indifferent drives their chase behaviour.
None of this however could be true.
Had an friend of a friend in high school who did some small time modeling (think wedding catalogues) competition is pretty bad among models. Heard stories how they use peanut based lotion around one that had allergies or how they try to sabotage each other's relationships when possible. If the small leagues where this bad I can only imagine how bad big time modeling gets among other things they're prob dealing with.
i heard (unsourced) that the impetus for extreme outlier models was about making the clothes look how they'd look on a hanger in the shop so maybe the look is about resembling a mannequin.
dunno what the "industry" is up to these days, i don't think i've seen a fashion-ass model in years and the few clothing ads that get around my blockers they're smiling because the message is "buy this shitty t-shirt and you'll be happy"
I knew a guy from high school that got into it. some national campaigns even. the serious/blank look thing is weird, but not universal to all modeling. I think it's reserved for fashion to highlight the clothing hanging off their bodies and has bled into those sort of fashion-adjacent marketing materials like high end scents and watches. which, personally, I think are inseparable from sexual expression rituals.
if not for the model, they are embedded in the dialogue between designer and audience... and those people create the standard for model behavior. I get the impression such people take themselves very seriously and therefore their intimacy is very serious too and doesn't contain room for jokes, laughter, etc.
I dunno, that's just my opinion. my friend has told me that modeling has been good for him, materially. its given him a lot of time to read books and travel internationally, but he does state explicitly that it's "fucked up" on the whole and that some big modeling cities have scenes that are dangerous and damaging to the models passing through.
another friend of mine has a cousin who also got into it and it seemed similar, though she brought up the phenomenon where rich people and certain celebs hang out adjacent to the fashion scene and have their assistants try to recruit/procure young models to their "parties". like 18-22 year olds, far from home sometimes for the first time, etc. the vibe being predatory/targeted.
personally, I would feel embarrassed relying on a friend to set me up with someone... but a subordinate employee?
anyway, I think of it like Hollywood generally: there is a shitload more "talent" than there are slots for them, so the gatekeepers exercise enormous power over the pool. and in this case, the talent pool is people who are aesthetically appealing proportionally, visually. since that's all that has "value", it's uniquely dehumanizing: it's not who you are or what you do, it's how you can visually appear and walk around. how limited!