History of World Expositions - EXPOS
Throughout its 150 years of its existence, the World EXPO has always brought in new knowledge coming from a given era and reflected development trends in human civilization. The main attraction of the first World EXPO in London in 1851 was the Crystal Palace: an almost five hundred meter-long palace built of cast iron and glass. Subsequently, the exhibiting countries would offer presentations of similar advantages at irregular intervals once every several years.
From simple expositions of artefacts in the 19th century, the EXPO movement graduated to a more complex introduction of exhibits during the 20th century, with all its associations and related matters and the Czech presentation scored not insignificant success. Krejcar’s pavilion at the 1937 Paris EXPO is considered today to be the forerunner of high-tech style and one of the milestones of modern world architecture. The last EXPO before WWII took place in 1939 in New York and then the world was divided first by WWII and then by the Iron Curtain.
In 1958, relations were truly chilly due to the Cold War, and this is why the meeting of the two worlds in Brussels commanded such an exceptional interest. Immediately on the first day, the exposition grounds attracted some 150 thousand visitors, and 41 million through its entire duration (from April to October). Among the wonders of Brussels, besides the Atomium and the Philips buildings by Le Corbusier, was a church for two and a half million worshippers built by the Vatican, and the civil engineering pavilion, a complicated structure - a statue by Van Doosselaere. It was in Brussels that Czechoslovakia scored its biggest success in EXPO history: it won a total of 56 prizes, including the prize for the best pavilion.
After Brussels, new communications concepts entered into the concept of the World Expos. The organizers began to make plans for associated events, i.e. congresses, seminars, festivals, interactive projects etc. The continuous emphasis on interactive interpretation was necessitated by globalization tendencies and development of new revolutionary technologies.
The last EXPO we participated in as Czechoslovakia was in 1992 in Seville and its successor, the Czech Republic was present at the latest expositions in Hannover (2000) and Aichi (2005). In Japan, the Czechs introduced the interactive Garden of Fantasy and Music, which was a relaxation area with optical as well as audio objects that visitors could try out. The Czech presentation was visited by almost 1.7 million visitors.
Today EXPO is the economic and cultural Olympiad of the world, a competition among nations, as well as among exhibitors from the private sector on a given subject. At the same time, it is about marketing countries internationally. Expositions of the first category last a maximum of 6 months and may be held on an enormous area. But at a time when information as well as goods can be had through the internet and other technologies, they remain a place of rendezvous and of authentic experiences.
Detailed information of the world expo movement can be found here.
