The Paris Exposition Internationale 1937

The Paris Exposition Internationale 1937

The 1937 Exposition Internationale, centred on the new Palais de Chaillot, was intended to celebrate ‘the arts and technologies of modern life’ but was hijacked by fascist and communist regimes determined to promote authoritarian ideologies. Organised during the socialist-led Popular Front and in the middle of the Spanish Civil War, the Exposition was an architectural battle-ground, symbolised by the aggressive juxtaposition of the Nazi (left) and Soviet (right) pavilions, designed by Albert Speer and Boris Iofan respectively. The Italian and the two Spanish pavilions (one for the Republicans, the other for the Nationalists) added to the sense of a continent in crisis. The British pavilion, by contrast, included a photograph of Neville Chamberlain on a fishing holiday.

Exposition Internationale des Arts et des Techniques Appliqués à la Vie Moderne, Paris 1937. Photographies en couleurs, Album Officiel / Chris Mullen, “The Visual Telling of Stories”, http://www.fulltable.com/vts/contents/jem.htm