The Portuguese colonial exhibition was a world's fair
held in Porto, Portugal in 1934 to display achievements of Portugal's colonies in Africa and Asia
and allow the visitors to travel throughout the empire in a metaphorical sense.
Portugal's director of 'Colonial Show Fairs'
Henrique Galvão who had represented Portugal at the
Paris Colonial Exposition in 1931 was made the technical director for this exhibition.
It was decided to re-use the
Palácio de Cristal which had been constructed for an
earlier exhibition in Porto.
It ran from 16
June to 30 September
and by the time it had closed there had been 1.5 million visitors.
Exhibits
The Exhibition featured over 400 exhibits placed around streets that were named after different areas of the Portuguese Empire.
The exhibits came from Portugal itself (
Braga,
Chaves,
Leixões,
Matosinhos
Matosinhos, Porto, Portugal () is a city and a municipality in the northern Porto district of Portugal, bordered in the south by the city of Porto (8 km from the city centre). The population in 2011 was 175,478, and covered an area of approx ...
and
Porto),
Angola,
Cape Verde
, national_anthem = ()
, official_languages = Portuguese
, national_languages = Cape Verdean Creole
, capital = Praia
, coordinates =
, largest_city = capital
, demonym ...
, Guinea (
Guinea-Bissau),
India,
Macao (including a reproduction of the
Guia lighthouse),
,
São Tomé and Príncipe
São Tomé and Príncipe (; pt, São Tomé e Príncipe (); English: " Saint Thomas and Prince"), officially the Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe ( pt, República Democrática de São Tomé e Príncipe), is a Portuguese-speaking i ...
, and Timor (
Portuguese Timor).
There were reproductions of villages from different colonies
and of the
Padrões of
Dighton and
Yellala,
along with a zoo, restaurants
a theatre, a cinema which showed
The Dawn Patrol'' and an amusement park.
The Macao pavilion included a teahouse and Chinese musicians while India was represented by a Hindu temple.
Indigenous Presence
As similar to other colonial exhibitions in Europe, native people from the colonies were present at the exhibition as features of the exhibits and as sources of anthropological study.
Reports say that 324 native people were at the colonial exhibition but only 185 were officially given assistance.
The indigenous people present were also the subjects of portraits such as those by the artist Eduardo Malta which were put to use as picture postcards.
Photography taken by Fotografia Alvão also involved the natives present at the exhibition.
While the indigenous people of the colonies were referred to as Portuguese citizens, they were also treated as being of the classification "indigenous" and were viewed as curiosities from the colonies.
References
External links
'Portugal is Not a Small Country' map used to show how big Portuguese colonies were
{{List of world's fairs in Portugal
1934 in Portugal
20th century in Porto
Festivals established in 1934
World's fairs in Portugal
Colonial exhibitions
Portuguese Empire