Latest / The History of Belgium: A Small Country with a Giant Colonial Legacy — Fexingo History
The 1958 World's Fair: Belgium's Modernist Mask
In 1958, Brussels hosted the first post-war World's Fair, a gleaming showcase of atomic-age optimism under the Atomium. But just steps from the pavilions celebrating progress, the Belgian Congo was exhibited in a way that revealed more about the colonizer than the colonized. This episode peels back the modernist facade to explore the Congolese village that shocked visitors, the political awakening it unwittingly fostered, and the fragile line between spectacle and reality. We follow the paths of Patrice Lumumba and Paul Panda Farnana, whose presence at Expo 58 became a quiet challenge to…
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