The Paris Colonial Expostion (or "Exposition coloniale internationale", International Colonial Exposition) was a six-month Colonial Exhibition held in Paris, France, in 1931, that attempted to display the diverse cultures and immense resources of France's colonial possessions. The exposition opened on 6 May1931 in the Bois de Vincennes on the eastern outskirts of Paris.[1] The scale was enormous;[2] Sculptor Elizabeth Prophet called it "the most spectacular colonial extravaganza ever staged in the West."[3] Some 33 million visitors came from around the world.[2] The French government brought people from the colonies to Paris and had them create native arts and crafts and perform in grandly scaled reproductions of their native architectural styles such as huts or temples.[4] Other nations participated in the event, including Belgium, Italy, Japan, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States.[2] The exhibition included a "human zoo," displaying nomadic Senegalese Villages.[5].
Politically, France hoped the exposition would paint its colonial empire in a beneficial light, showing the mutual exchange of cultures and the benefit of France's efforts overseas. This would thus negate German criticisms that France was "the exploiter of colonial societies [and] the agent of miscegenation and decadence". The exposition highlighted the endemic cultures of the colonies and downplayed French efforts to spread its own language and culture abroad, thus advancing the notion that France was associating with colonised societies, not assimilating them.[4]
The Colonial Exposition provided a forum for the discussion of colonialism in general and of French colonies specifically. French authorities published over 3,000 reports during the six-month period and held over 100 congresses. The exposition served as a vehicle for colonial writers to publicise their works, and it created a market in Paris for various ethnic cuisines, particularly North African and Vietnamese. Filmmakers chose French colonies as the subjects of their works. The Permanent Colonial Museum (today the Musée des Arts Africains et Océaniens) opened at the end of the exposition. The colonial service experienced a boost in applications.[4]
A smaller counter-exhibition entitled The Truth on the Colonies, organized by the Communist Party, attracted very few visitors (5000 in 8 months)[6]. in the first room, it recalled Albert Londres and André Gide's critics of forced labour in the colonies.
Leininger-Miller, Theresa A. (2001). New Negro Artist in Paris: African American Painters & Sculptors in the City of Light, 1922–1934. Piscataway, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press.
Catherine Hodeir. 1931, l'exposition coloniale (La memoire du siecle). Editions Complexe, Paris. (1991) ISBN 2870273827
Further reading
Morton, Patricia A. (2000). Hybrid Modernities: Representation and Architecture at 1931 International Colonial Exposition in Paris. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press.
