Colonial exhibition

Type of exhibition held to promote colonial empires

Counter-exposition to the 1931 Colonial Exhibition in Paris. Map of the 1894 Lyon fair Overview of 1896 exhibition Postcard from Brussels International Postcard of the Palais d'expositions at Hanoi Exhibition Bird's eye view of the Franco-British exhibition The Royal Agricultural Hall site of the rubber exhibition Replica of Canada Parliament Building at Festival of Empire Overview of the colonial exhibition of Semarang. The Palace of Industry building from British Empire Exhibition

A colonial exhibition was a type of international exhibition that was held to boost trade. During the 1880s and beyond, colonial exhibitions had the additional aim of bolstering popular support for the various colonial empires during the New Imperialism period, which included the scramble for Africa.

The first colonial exhibition, in Victoria, Australia, in 1866, was the progeny of 25 years of similar exhibitions held in Melbourne, in which other colonies within the Australian continent participated.

Perhaps the most notable colonial exhibition was the 1931 Paris Colonial Exposition, which lasted six months and sold 33 million tickets.[1] Paris's Colonial Exhibition opened on 6 May 1931 on 110 hectares (272 acres) of the Bois de Vincennes. The exhibition included dozens of temporary museums and façades representing the various colonies of the European nations, as well as several permanent buildings. Among these were the Palais de la Porte Dorée, designed by architect Albert Laprode, which then housed the Musée permanent des Colonies, and serves today as the Cité nationale de l'histoire de l'immigration.[1]

The French Communist Party held an anti-colonial counter-exhibition near the 1931 Colonial Exhibition, titled The Truth About the Colonies. The first section was dedicated to crimes during the colonial conquests, and quoted Albert Londres and André Gide's criticisms of forced labour. The second one contrasted the Soviet Union's "nationalities policy" with "imperialist colonialism".

Germany and Portugal also staged colonial exhibitions. Human zoos were featured in some of the exhibitions, such as the Parisian 1931 exhibition.[2]

The Empire of Japan hosted colonial showcases in exhibitions within the Home Islands, but also held several full-scale expositions inside its colonies of Korea and Taiwan. These exhibitions had objectives comparable to their European counterparts, highlighting economic achievements and social progress under Japanese colonial rule to Japanese and colonial subjects alike.

A British Empire flag distributed at the British Empire Exhibition.

Brussels was the venue for the last colonial exhibition: the Belgian Foire coloniale, held in 1948.

## Colonial exhibitions

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Exhibitions that may be described as colonial exhibitions include the following.

Name of exhibition  | Date  | Location  | Country  | Notes

|
|
|
|

Sydney International Exhibition | 1879 | Sydney |  New South Wales | [note 1]
Internationale Koloniale en Uitvoerhandel Tentoonstelling | 1883 | Amsterdam |  Netherlands |
Colonial and Indian Exhibition | 1886 | London |  United Kingdom |
Philippines Exposition | 1887 | Madrid |  Spain |
Exposition Universelle | 1889 | Paris |  France |
Exposition internationale et coloniale | 1894 | Lyon |  France |
Exposição Insular e Colonial Portuguesa | 1894 | Porto |  Portugal |
Great Industrial Exposition | 1896 | Berlin |  Germany |
Exposition nationale et coloniale | 1896 | Rouen |  France |
Brussels International | 1897 | Brussels |  Belgium |
Exposition internationale et coloniale | 1898 | Rochefort |  France |
Greater America Exposition | 1899 | Omaha |  United States |
Hanoi exhibition | 1902 | Hanoi |  French Indochina |
United States, Colonial and International Exposition[citation needed] | 1902 | New York City |  United States |
Marseille colonial exhibition [fr] | 1906 | Marseille |  France |
Exposition Coloniale | 1907 | Paris |  France |
Franco-British Exhibition | 1908 | London |  United Kingdom | [note 2][citation needed]
Festival of Empire | 1911 | London |  United Kingdom |
Exposition Universelle | 1910 | Brussels |  Belgium |
International exhibition of marine and maritime hygiene | 1914 | Genoa |  Italy |
Colonial Exhibition | 1914 | Semarang |  Dutch East Indies | [note 3]
Joseon Industrial Exhibition | 1915 | Gyeongseong (Seoul) |  Japanese Korea |
International Exhibition of Rubber and Other Tropical Products | 1921 | London |  United Kingdom |
Exposition nationale coloniale | 1922 | Marseille |  France |
British Empire Exhibition | 1924 | London |  United Kingdom |
Chosun Exhibition | 1929 | Gyeongseong (Seoul) |  Japanese Korea
Exposition internationale coloniale, maritime et d'art flamand | 1930 | Antwerp[5] |  Belgium |
Paris Colonial Exposition | 1931 | Paris |  France | [note 4][citation needed]
Exposição Colonial Portuguesa | 1934 | Porto |  Portugal |
Taiwan Exposition | 1935 | Taihoku (Taipei) |  Japanese Formosa |
Empire Exhibition | 1936 | Johannesburg |  South Africa | [note 5]
Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne | 1937  | Paris |  France |
Empire Exhibition | 1938 | Glasgow |  United Kingdom |
Deutsche Kolonial Ausstellung | 1939 | Dresden |  Nazi Germany |
Exposição do Mundo Português | 1940 | Lisbon |  Portugal | [note 6][citation needed]
Foire coloniale | 1948 | Brussels |  Belgium |
Entrance to the Korea Exhibition, Seoul, 1929

## Notes

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1. ^ Exhibitions in Australia started 25 years earlier, when the colonies of Victoria and New South Wales, inspired by the 1851 Great Exhibition in London, mounted their own exhibitions in 1854 in preparation for the Paris Exhibition of 1855 and in 1861 for the London Exhibition of 1862. These earlier exhibitions were known as Metropolitan Intercolonial Exhibitions: "intercolonial" referring to the Australian colonies that became states of Australia after federation in 1901, not those in separate countries of the British Empire.[3]
2. ^ The exhibition celebrated the Entente Cordiale signed in 1904 by the United Kingdom and France.
3. ^ The exhibition was to "give a comprehensive picture of the Dutch Indies in their present prosperous condition".[4]
4. ^ This six-month exhibition attempted to display the diverse cultures and immense resources of France's colonial possessions.
5. ^ The Empire Exhibition held in Johannesburg from 15 September 1936 to 15 January 1937 was the first time the Empire Exhibition was held outside of Britain.[6] It was seen as an opportunity for the expansion of British trade.[7] It coincided with Johannesburg's Jubilee and was staged on a grand scale, with over twenty acres of industrial and commercial exhibits.[8] It was opened by the Governor-General.[9]
6. ^ Held primarily as a celebration of the Estado Novo. One foreign nation, Brazil, participated in the exhibition.

## References

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1. ^ a b Blevis, Laure; Lafout-Couturieur, Hélène; et al. (2008). 1931: Les Étrangers au temps de l'Exposition Coloniale. Paris: Gallimard.
2. ^ "From human zoos to colonial apotheoses: the era of exhibiting the Other". Centro de Estudos Sociais. Retrieved 3 February 2014.
3. ^ Cowley, Des (1995). "Over the border: Victoria at interstate exhibitions". The La Trobe Journal. The State Library Victoria. Retrieved 22 July 2019.
4. ^ "Calendar". The Independent. 13 July 1914. Retrieved 5 August 2012.
5. ^ Pelle, Findling, ed. (2008). "Appendix B:Fair Statistics". Encyclopedia of World's Fairs and Expositions. McFarland & Company, Inc. p. 415\. ISBN 978-0-7864-3416-9.
6. ^ "Lexicon – Empire Exhibition". Retrieved 5 December 2013.
7. ^ "Empire Exhibition at Johannesburg". Nature. 137 (3457): 182. 1936. Bibcode:1936Natur.137Q.182.. doi:10.1038/137182a0.
8. ^ "Souvenir Catalogue, Empire Exhibition, Johannesburg (1936)". Retrieved 30 January 2016.
9. ^ "British Pathe News: South Africa's Empire Exhibition". YouTube. Archived from the original on 14 December 2021. Retrieved 30 January 2016.

## Bibliography

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* Alexander C.T. Geppert, Fleeting Cities. Imperial Expositions in Fin-de-Siècle Europe, Basingstoke/New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010.

## See also

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* Colonialism
* Human zoo
* List of world's fairs
* Impact of Western European colonialism and colonisation

## External links

[edit]

* Exposition Coloniale of Paris 1931 photographs

* v
* t
* e

World exhibitions

* Bureau International des Expositions (BIE)

Retroactively
recognized
expositions|

* London 1851
* Paris 1855
* London 1862
* Paris 1867
* Vienna 1873
* Philadelphia 1876
* Paris 1878
* Melbourne 1880
* Barcelona 1888
* Paris 1889
* Chicago 1893
* Brussels 1897
* Paris 1900
* St. Louis 1904
* Liège 1905
* Milan 1906
* Brussels 1910
* Turin 1911
* Ghent 1913
* San Francisco 1915
* Barcelona 1929
* Seville 1929
* Chicago 1933

BIE-recognized
Universal
expositions|

* Brussels 1935
* Paris 1937
* New York 1939–1940
* Port-au-Prince 1949
* Brussels 1958
* Seattle 1962
* Montreal 1967
* Osaka 1970
* Chicago 1992‡
* Seville 1992
* Hannover 2000
* Aichi 2005
* Shanghai 2010
* Milan 2015
* Dubai 2020†
* Osaka 2025
* Riyadh 2030

BIE-recognized
specialized
expositions|

* Stockholm 1936
* Helsinki 1938
* Liège 1939
* Paris 1947
* Stockholm 1949
* Lyon 1949
* Lille 1951
* Jerusalem 1953
* Rome 1953
* Naples 1954
* Turin 1955
* Helsingborg 1955
* Beit Dagan 1956
* Berlin 1957
* Turin 1961
* Munich 1965
* San Antonio 1968
* Budapest 1971
* Spokane 1974
* Okinawa 1975
* Plovdiv 1981
* Knoxville 1982
* New Orleans 1984
* Plovdiv 1985
* Tsukuba 1985
* Vancouver 1986
* Brisbane 1988
* Plovdiv 1991
* Genoa 1992
* Taejŏn 1993
* Lisbon 1998
* Zaragoza 2008
* Yeosu 2012
* Astana 2017
* Buenos Aires 2023‡
* Belgrade 2027

BIE-recognized
horticultural
exhibitions (AIPH)|

* Rotterdam 1960
* Paris 1969
* Amsterdam 1972
* Hamburg 1973
* Vienna 1974
* Montreal 1980
* Amsterdam 1982
* Munich 1983
* Liverpool 1984
* Osaka 1990
* Zoetermeer 1992
* Stuttgart 1993
* Kunming 1999
* Haarlemmermeer 2002
* Rostock 2003
* Chiang Mai 2006–2007
* Venlo 2012
* Antalya 2016
* Beijing 2019
* Almere 2022
* Doha 2023
* Yokohama 2027

Not BIE-
recognized|

| Africa|

* Freetown 1865
* Cape Town 1877
* Kimberley 1892–1893
* Johannesburg 1936–1937

|

Asia|

* Calcutta 1883–1884
* Hanoi 1902
* Nanking 1910
* Semarang 1914
* Hangzhou 1929
* Taihoku (Taipei) 1935
* Nagoya 1937
* Clark 1998
* Shenyang 2006
* Chiang Mai 2011–2012
* Udon Thani 2026

Europe|

* London 1760
* Dublin 1853
* Manchester 1857
* Porto 1865
* Stockholm 1866
* London 1871–1874
* Lyon 1872
* Vienna 1873
* Amsterdam 1883
* Liverpool 1886
* London 1886
* Copenhagen 1888
* Glasgow 1888
* Frankfurt 1891
* Prague 1891
* Lyon 1894
* Oporto 1894
* Berlin 1896
* Stockholm 1897
* Glasgow 1901
* Cork 1902
* London 1905
* London 1906
* Marseille 1906
* Dublin 1907
* London 1908
* Zaragoza 1908
* London 1910
* Dresden 1911
* London 1911
* London 1912
* Lyon 1914
* Cologne 1914
* London 1914
* Kristiania 1914
* Malmö 1914
* London 1921
* Marseille 1922
* Gothenburg 1923
* British Empire Exhibition 1924–1925
* Antwerp 1930
* Stockholm 1930
* Paris 1931
* Porto 1934
* Glasgow 1938
* Stockholm 1943

North America|

* New York City 1826–1897
* Bryant Park, New York City 1853
* Atlanta 1881
* Louisville 1883–1887
* New Orleans 1884
* Atlanta 1887
* San Francisco 1894
* Atlanta 1895
* Nashville 1897
* Omaha 1898
* Buffalo 1901
* Charleston 1901–1902
* Portland, Oregon 1905
* Jamestown 1907
* Seattle 1909
* Knoxville 1913
* San Diego 1915–1917
* Bronx 1918
* Philadelphia 1926
* San Diego 1935–1936
* Dallas 1936
* Cleveland 1936–1937
* Dallas 1937
* San Francisco 1939–1940
* Chicago 1940
* New York City 1964–1965

Oceania|

* Melbourne 1866
* Sydney 1870
* Melbourne 1875
* Brisbane 1876
* Sydney 1879
* Adelaide 1887
* Melbourne 1888
* Dunedin 1889
* Christchurch 1906
* Auckland 1913–1914
* Dunedin 1925
* Wellington 1939–1940

South America|

* Lima 1872
* Santiago 1875
* Quito 1909
* Buenos Aires 1910
* Rio de Janeiro 1922

* † Postponed to 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic
* ‡ Cancelled
* World portal

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