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The Tokyo Peace Exhibition (Japanese: 平和記念東京博覧会, Hepburn: Heiwa Kinen Tōkyō Hakurankai), also known in English as the Peace Memorial Tokyo Exposition and the Peace Commemorative Exposition, was an exposition held from March 10 to July 31, 1922, at Ueno Park, Tokyo, to commemorate the Allied victory in the First World War. Organized by an official exposition bureau (博覧会事務局, Hakurankai Jimukyoku), it opened at the moment Japanese delegates were returning home from the Washington Naval Conference, becoming the largest and most popular Japanese exposition held to that time, with more than eleven million visitors—a record for a Taishō era exhibition.[1][2]
Background
[edit]According to historian Frederick R. Dickinson, the exposition grew out of the optimism of the early 1920s, when Japan's participation in the Washington Naval Conference of 1921–22 was seen at home as a triumph of international cooperation and disarmament, and The Tokyo Asahi described the fair as representing "the best of world culture" and "a harbinger of dazzling beauty."[1] By the Taishō era the state-building exhibitions of the Meiji period had given way to exhibitions as entertainment and spectacle, and the Tokyo Peace Exhibition was conceived on a correspondingly grand scale: costing roughly 6 million yen, with almost fifty pavilions, two triumphal gates, and a natural lake covering some 110,000 square metres, it was described as the largest Japanese exposition to date.[1][3]
The exposition opened on March 10, 1922, shortly after the conclusion of the Washington Naval Conference, timed to coincide with the return of Japan's delegates and with the annual cherry blossom season at Ueno.[3] At the opening ceremony, festival chairman Prince Kan'in Kotohito, flanked by celebratory pine, plum and bamboo, tolled a dedicated "peace bell" and released doves, declaring that world sentiment was weary of "the ghastly evils of war" and full of "admiration for the happiness of peace."[1] Official English-language materials dated the event "March 10–July 31, 1922".[4]
Grounds and exhibits
[edit]The grounds were divided into two sections. The first, laid out on the heights of Ueno Park, was dominated by a peace tower designed by the architect Sutemi Horiguchi, a leading figure of the Bunriha ("Secessionist") architecture group influenced by the Vienna Secession; the tower was modelled on the Wedding Tower at Darmstadt.[3] The five entrances were arched in the shape of Mount Fuji. A second section surrounded Shinobazu Pond, around which clustered the exhibition's most popular attractions, from the Hokkaido pavilion and colonial exhibits to amusement rides; a contemporary account in The Japan Magazine likened the shoreline buildings to "architectural oddities, with unexpected humps in the roofs and extraordinary bumps in walls."[3][5]
Pavilions and special buildings included those of Japan's colonies and overseas territories—Taiwan, Karafuto, Korea, Manchuria–Mongolia, and the South Seas mandate—as well as prefectural pavilions, industrial and machinery halls, an agricultural and sericulture hall, a "foreign lands" building, the Sumitomo pavilion, and a section of modern "culture houses" (文化住宅, bunka jūtaku), together with airplane demonstrations and a touring hydroplane ride over the pond.[2][3] Meiji-era and colonial pavilion architecture, photography, and even the exposition's official map—designed by Koijūrō Yoshida—were widely reproduced in commemorative postcards, albums, and administrative reports.[4]
Attendance and legacy
[edit]The exposition drew more than 11 million visitors, a record for a Taishō-period exhibition, making it the most popular Japanese exposition of its era.[2] Its cherry-blossom backdrop fed a wider cultural shift identified by Dickinson, in which the cherry blossom became newly associated with the "culture of peace" of the 1920s.[1] The exposition was commemorated in souvenir postcards, photographic albums, posters (including an official poster by the graphic designer Sugiyama Sueo), and map prints.[2][3]
The opening of the exposition coincided with the debut on April 2, 1922, of Japan's oldest weekly magazines: the inaugural covers of Sunday Mainichi and its rival Shūkan Asahi both carried photographs taken at the fair.[6] Images and printed records of the exposition are held in archives including the Library of Congress and the Stanford University Libraries.[7][8]
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- 1 2 3 4 5 Dickinson, Frederick R. (2013). World War I and the Triumph of a New Japan, 1919-1930. Cambridge University Press.
- 1 2 3 4 Hiro, Rika (2020). "Heiwa Kinen Tokyo Hakurankai (The Peace Memorial Tokyo Exposition)". Unpinning History: Japanese Posters in the Age of Commercialism, Imperialism, and Modernism. University of Southern California. Retrieved September 6, 2026.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 Sundberg, Steve. "Peace Commemorative Exposition, Ueno Park, Tokyo, 1922". Old Tokyo. Retrieved September 6, 2026.
- 1 2 平和記念東京博覧会絵 [Map of the Tokyo Peace Exhibition]. MeijiShowa. Retrieved September 6, 2026.
Tokyo Peace Exhibition (…), which took place in Ueno Park, Tokyo from March 10 through July 31, 1922 (Taisho 11).
- ↑ "The Tokyo Peace Exhibition". The Japan Magazine. Vol. 12, no. 9. February 1922. pp. 495–497. Retrieved September 6, 2026 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Schreiber, Mark (2022). "Japan's savvy, salacious shukanshi". Number 1 Shimbun. Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan. Retrieved September 6, 2026.
- ↑ "Formosa Bldg. (i.e. Building) Peace Expos., Tokyo". Library of Congress. Retrieved September 6, 2026.
- ↑ "Tōkyō Hakurankai Jimukyoku kyoka Heiwa Kinen Tōkyō Hakurankai ekibijō hikae". Stanford University Libraries. Retrieved September 6, 2026.
External links
[edit]
Media related to Tokyo Peace Exhibition at Wikimedia Commons
