Vincennes 1931: The Exposition Coloniale as the Apotheosis of Imperial Modernity

Abstract

By 1931, six years after the British Empire Exhibition, the exposition medium had long attained a certain classicism. As strategies of display became increasingly refined, each succeeding exposition drew upon established architectural forms and a certain grammar, applying a wide range of modern technologies already tested and proven effective. Considered from an exclusively national perspective, the Exposition Coloniale Internationale de Paris, held on the capital’s eastern fringes in the Bois de Vincennes, was the penultimate of the great French expositions in the twentieth century. While by no means the century’s last international exhibition, this exposition constituted a preliminary endpoint in terms of scale, grandeur and impact.²

Soleil soleil d’au-delà des mers tu angélises

la barbe excrémentielle des gouverneurs

Soleil de corail et d’ébène

Soleil des esclaves numérotés

Soleil de nudité soleil d’opium soleil de flagellation

Soleil du feu d’artifice en l’honneur de la prise de la Bastille

au-dessus de Cayenne un quatorze juillet

Il pleut il pleut à verse sur l’Exposition coloniale

(Louis Aragon)¹