 | This publicity poster for the 1933 World's Fair in Chicago is among the items on view in the exhibit "World's Fairs and the Landscapes of the Modern Metropolis." |
The Chicago World's Columbian Expedition of 1893, with its idealized "White City," has been described as the "fair that changed America" because of its longstanding influence on urban architecture and city planning.
The impact of that event and other international expeditions is explored in "World's Fairs and the Landscapes of the Modern Metropolis," a new exhibition opening on Tuesday, Jan. 16, at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.
Over a dozen world fairs -- from the London exposition of 1851 in the Crystal Palace through the 1939 World's Fairs on New York's Flushing Meadows and San Francisco's Treasure Island -- are featured in the show, which runs through the end of March.
The exhibition is based on a major World's Fair Collection recently purchased by the Beinecke Library, which includes posters, photographs, pamphlets, commemorative books, maps, government reports and a rich array of colorful vintage ephemera covering a century of world expositions.
To mark the opening of the exhibition, the library will host a talk by Alfred Heller, author of "World's Fairs and the End of Progress" and editor of World's Fair magazine. Heller originally formed the collection now at the Beinecke Library. The talk will take place at 5:15 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 19, at the library; it is free and open to the public.
Sculpting with color and light, with glass and steel and reinforced concrete, the World's Fairs of the 19th and early 20th centuries transformed the emerging metropolitan landscapes of Europe and America into dream cities. Paris is one example of a European metropolis that was forever changed by its fairs. Not only was the Eiffel Tower built for the 1889 exhibition held there, but such familiar features of the Parisian landscape as the stone embankments of the Seine, central bridges and railway stations, major boulevards, and metro stations can all be traced to the fairs of the 19th century.
From their birth in the Industrial and French Revolutions, the small technical exhibitions that evolved into the mass spectacle of the World's Fair played an integral part in the economic and political realities of the modern world. Sparse catalogues and lists of local manufacturers grew into detailed surveys of regional, national and international development. Intricate administrative networks emerged to organize the fairs, producing the first comprehensive mapping of industrial societies in weighty government reports.
By the mid-19th century, railway lines and steamships were conveying crowds of spectators from all classes to the exhibitions, driving their rapid expansion. The growing size and changing complexion of the fairs posed other challenges as well: the need for architectural spaces suited for the effective presentation of visual information; for effective systems of traffic flow and crowd control; and for infrastructure capable of providing water, power and sanitation on unheard-of scales. The technical challenges of putting on a World's Fair both anticipated and mirrored those faced in building modern cities, and the history of the fairs is closely intertwined with the emergence of contemporary city planning.
Seeking to entertain as well as to instruct, organizers and exhibitors produced masses of promotional material -- guide books, commemorative albums, postcards, posters and peepshows -- which added to the enormous mountain of paper left behind by the fairs. These materials also illustrate the hopes, fears and fascinations that accompanied the rise of modern consumer culture. A cross-section of this material is on display at the Beinecke.
Among the history of the world's fairs highlighted in the exhibition are: Daniel Burnham's "White City" and the Chicago World Exhibition of 1893; the Eiffel Tower in construction; the first moving sidewalks; a "Trip to the Moon" at the Buffalo Pan-American Exhibition of 1901; the building of three palaces in downtown Paris; and "Rome on the Sea" and the ill-fated World's Fair of 1942 (cancelled due to World War II).
The Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library is located at 121 Wall St. Exhibition gallery hours are Monday-Thursday, 8:30 a.m.-8 p.m.; Friday, 8:30 a.m.-5 p.m.; and Saturday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Admission is free. For further information, call (203) 432-2977 or visit the website at www.library.yale.edu/beinecke.
T H I S
Beinecke Library exhibit
explores impact of world fairs
W E E K ' SS T O R I E S
Study reveals more effective approach to curbing HIV spread
DeVane Lectures to ask: Are sustainability and capitalism compatible?
Celebrating the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr.
Former deputy secretary of U.N. to be visiting fellow this spring
ENDOWED PROFESSORSHIPS
Elefteriades is named as Glenn Professor
Salem will hold the Lampman Professorship
Tsai is designated as Robert Young Professor
Udelsman appointed to William Carmalt Chair
Streamlined office . . . aims to enhance postdoctoral experience
Global Village Shelters to be on exhibit at the Divinity School
Play shows 'humanity behind the statistics' of AIDS epidemic
Beinecke Library exhibit explores impact of world fairs
SCHOOL OF MEDICINE NEWS
Team maps gene for nicotine dependence to chromosome 5
Expanded Medicare benefit increased early diagnosis . . .
Grant supports work to eliminate disparities in . . .
Study: Estrogen curbs appetite in same way as the hormone leptin
Research shows impact of racial discrimination in . . .
'Graying' of group health insurance demographic may strain . . .
Report: Swedish massage helps osteoarthritis of knee
Coca-Prados gets inside-view of pharmaceutical industry at Pfizer
'Marat/Sade' offers audiences 'a full-scale theatrical assault . . .'
Rudd Center awards Golden Apples for innovative ideas to battle obesity
New exhibit at Jonathan Edwards College features portraits, drawings . . .
Memorial in honor of Ellen Hudson Graham
Conductor to present series on 'Reflections on Bach'
Yale trustee's Vietnam memorial wins award
Yale Books in Brief
Campus Notes
Bulletin Home|Visiting on Campus|Calendar of Events|In the News
Bulletin Board|Classified Ads|Search Archives|Deadlines
Bulletin Staff|Public Affairs|News Releases|
E-Mail Us|Yale Home