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My curiosity piqued, I set off for the Jardin d'Acclimatation. This zoological garden was opened by Emperor Napoleon III in 1860 and for over 150 years has hosted countless millions of visitors and has been the stage for several bizarre Parisian stories - elephants that get served for dinner, a tower for pigeons, the location of the stockyards during the Siege of Paris, and the focus of today's blog - human exhibitions. The small gallery in the Musee des Enfants covers the same themes as a much larger exposition at the musee du quai Branly with a similar title - "L'invention du Sauvage" - which was on display November 2011 until June 2012 (hosting 265,000 visitors), but unlike the musee du quai Branly with its modern facilities beneath the Eiffel Tower, the windows of the Musee des Enfants look out directly onto the grounds where human exhibitions took place.
To begin, a bit of background is necessary on human exhibitions. Beginning with Columbus, explorers returned from their voyages with inhabitants of their new found lands in tow. Originally these peoples were presented only to the royal courts who funded expeditions, but by the 19th century a mix of imperialism, scientific interest, good old-fashioned capitalism, and voyeurism came together for the rise of ethnic displays and entertainment shows. Starting in 1810 with the exhibitions of Saartjie Baartman, known as "The Hottentot Venus," the practice of human exhibitions grew rapidly through the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The most famous examples were the freak shows of the Barnum and Bailey Circus, Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show, World Fairs, and Universal Expositions, as well as smaller cabaret shows such as a show featuring Zulus at the Folies Bergères in Paris.
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Tourist postcards, posters, and other souvenirs testify to the merchandising prospect of human exposition. |
The museum exhibit points to several reasons as to why the shows came to an end. Most notably a general lack of interest from the public lead to their demise. By the 1930s urban dwellers were increasingly accustomed to seeing different people from different cultural backgrounds and motion pictures took viewers to the far corners of the world in the comfort of a theatre.
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An advertisement for an exhibition, early 20th Century |
Le Jardin d'Acclimatation, 2013
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Today, the Jardin d'Acclimatation, mostly registers on your to-do list if you're visiting Paris with young children who need to run around in a grassy space (a rarity in Paris). The unique history of the park is displayed on numerous exhibit panels around the grounds, although years of re-landscaping have long removed any trace of where the ethnographic spectacles took place. If you're interested in this subject, the musée du quai Branly published a wonderful catalogue to their exhibit. To learn more about their exhibit click here. If you're in Paris on a nice day I highly recommend a stroll through the Jardin d'Acclimatation, which is a short walk from the Porte Maillot metro station -the same way visitors reached the park a century ago for these exhibitions!