All the world’s a stage: Paris 1855

Abstract

I 1855 Parisians believed that their city was the centre of the world. On 15 May of that year emperor Napoleon III opened the second World’s Fair, which would attract over five million visitors. To Napoleon, this exposition was the international affirmation of his reign. Charles Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, the third son of Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, king of Holland, was elected president of the new French Republic in 1848. In 1852, he abandoned his republican ideals and had himself crowned emperor Napoleon III of France. He ordered the construction of the Palais de l’Industrie, a magnificent structure of glass and iron between the Champs-Élysées and the river Seine. The design was reminiscent of the Crystal Palace in London, which had been built for the Great Exhibition of 1851. The colossal Palais provided accommodation for the 21,779 industrial exhibitors. At 250 metres long, 108 metres wide and 35 metres high, it was one of the largest, if not the most elegant, modern structures in Paris according to the Baedeker of 1878. The exposition’s 2,175 fine art entries were housed in a separate building, the Palais des Beaux-Arts. The construction of the palaces was an integral part of the grandiose urban renewal project that the emperor asked prefect Georges Haussmann to carry out in 1853. The visitors to the World’s Fair witnessed the beginning of a demolition and construction craze that would grip the city for years to come. Napoleon also employed less peaceful means to raise the prestige of his empire. In 1854, France and Britain declared war on Russia. The Crimean War would reach a tragic low point with the siege of Sevastopol, which coincided with the Paris exposition. The siege came to an end when the French breached the Malakoff bastion on 8 September, two days before the opening of the second international statistical congress. The congress delegates were not especially concerned with the Crimean War. Nevertheless, Carl Friedrich Wilhelm Dieterici, who represented the