The Great Exhibition
What was the Great Exhibition?
The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations (The Great Exhibition) was a massive World Fair that exhibited and boasted global modernisation and industrialisation, particularly that within the British Empire. Yet viewed from today’s perspective, it also exposes the imperialist foundations that made such “progress” possible.
It took place inside the Crystal Palace in Hyde Park, London, from 1 May to 15 October 1851 and was attended by 6 million people. This was equivalent to one third of Britain’s population at the time. In 1851, the Great Exhibition exemplified optimism and industrial triumph. Today, it also symbolises something more complicated. It reveals how Victorian Britain understood itself: as modern, advanced, and destined to lead the world. At the same time, it reminds us that industrial glory and imperial domination were intertwined.
The Great Exhibition was open to all classes of British society at the height of the Empire’s strength. A ticket could cost as little as a shilling, equivalent to around five pounds today. Exhibits didn’t just feature British industry, there were over 100,000 exhibits that showcased industrial and technological progress from around the world. Meanwhile, international travel was expensive and time-consuming. As such, the Great Exhibition was formative to the majority of attendees’ worldview, being their first exposure to other countries for a minimal cost. It is impossible to separate the Great Exhibition from the British Empire, a structure that was built on military power, subjugation, and control of the colonies.
Why are we marking 175 years?
The Festival, as part of the cultural district of South Kensington, is also part of the legacy of the Great Exhibition. Ahead of the anniversary year, there is a need to share the often-untold stories of the Great Exhibition, and to acknowledge the achievements of overlooked individuals and communities, as well as their contributions to the British Empire. 2026 is 175 years since the Great Exhibition, and the Festival invites you to explore its legacy and ongoing impact in science, the arts, innovation and communities today.
Exhibition Road, where the Festival takes place, is named after the Great Exhibition and is just one part of its far-reaching legacy. Prince Albert, husband to Queen Victoria, was a major organiser, benefactor and promoter of the event. He championed of art, science and culture, as well as an advocate for social cohesion and the overall improvement of British society. The financial profit and public support for innovation that began at the Great Exhibition was the catalyst for the founding of many of the academic institutions and museums in South Kensington, such as Imperial College London, the Science Museum, the V&A and the Natural History Museum.
Without the Great Exhibition, South Kensington would not be the home to science and art that it is today. But as with much telling of the history of the British Empire, it is important that we do not neglect those who had little agency over their representation in the Great Exhibition, which served to perpetuate and justify the advancement of the Empire’s ‘civilising mission’ in 1851.
A "Great” Exhibition?
The Great Exhibition of 1851 was considered "Great" due to its unprecedented scale, success, and ambition. It was one of the first international exhibitions of diverse industry from across the world, attracting over six million visitors.
A visitor could see stuffed animals from all over the world, new mechanical inventions, and all types of design and culture, from musical instruments to locomotives. The Great Exhibition was even home to the world’s first pay-to-use public toilets, and the origin of the phrase “spend a penny”.
But there was a side to the Great Exhibition that was not great.
Exhibits didn’t just feature British industry, but also products from all over the Empire. These objects were often on display out of admiration for their ingenuity, beauty and craftsmanship, but there was a failure to recognise the skills and attributes of the people who had created them, as well as very little reliable information about the objects’ provenance. The Great Exhibition platformed the value of many British colonies and non-Western nations only through their natural resources, in addition to positioning indigenous societies as ‘primitive’ and ‘exotic’, which served to reinforce the notion of a clear racial hierarchy. There were also deep-rooted prejudices among the upper economic classes, which led to widespread panic that an event accessible to all tiers of society would lead to social upheaval and chaos. To platform and celebrate these objects (often captured as spoils of colonial wars) without recognizing the individuals and community contributions behind them is illustrative of the hegemonic attitude of the British Empire in its expansion.
What are some examples of that?
The United States exhibit utilised Indigenous American culture, dress and tools to unfairly portray them as “savage”, upholding their otherness against the industrial, technological, and agricultural advancement of white settlers. The American exhibit was as much an opportunity to promote the “Manifest Destiny” ideology – the belief that America belonged to white settlers by divine ordinance – as it was to display commercial progress.
The US exhibit became a further site of racial tension, with fugitive black abolitionists from America, such as William Wells Brown and William and Ellen Craft, using the event as a platform to protest slavery in the US. The Greek Slave Statue by Hiram Powers (featured in the United States exhibit) was where abolitionists chose to platform their anti-slavery protest, drawing the attention of hundreds of thousands of visitors to the Great Exhibition. The concept of race was inescapable to any visitor.
Meanwhile, the India exhibit was presented entirely by The East India Company, which in 1851 was the largest corporation in the world, and had a larger military force than that of many nation states. The British-run corporation dominated global trade, specialising in spices, cotton and tea. The East India Company relied heavily upon slavery until its abolition, at which point the company merely shifted to indentured labour contracts, a deeply exploitative practice that gave workers little more freedom than bondage. India was therefore represented on the world stage through a lens of exoticism and ‘otherness’ by their colonisers.
For example, the presence of the Koh-i-Noor diamond (the so-called ‘Jewel of India’) at the Great Exhibition was presented as a crowning achievement of the British Empire’s power and superiority over India. The ‘must-see’ jewel was forcibly taken from the Indian Royal Family by the East India Company in 1849, and became a special possession of Queen Victoria: she often wore it as a brooch after the Great Exhibition.
Elsewhere in the Crystal Palace was the Caribbean exhibit. The display was devoid of any presence of Caribbean culture, instead only focusing on the use of the region to the British Empire through the extraction of raw materials, such as sugar, spices and cotton.
In addition to racial hierarchies, wealth inequality was also inescapable at the Great Exhibition. The building of the Crystal Palace was achieved in just nine months due to an unreasonably rapid pace and highly pressurised working conditions, which consequently triggered labour disputes across the workforce. In addition, a visitor’s social class deeply affected their day out at the Great Exhibition. The price point of a ticket varied immensely, with the more expensive tickets giving wealthier visitors the opportunity to see the attractions in a quieter, more exclusive environment. Those who could not afford more than a shilling had a vastly different experience, with the Crystal Palace often becoming so crowded that they could not actually reach many of the exhibits to view them.
1851 marked a time of deep economic inequality, with the top 0.5% of the population possessing a quarter of the nation’s wealth. The rich and poor lived almost entirely separately from one another, yet suddenly there was a proposition to give everyone access to the same event, irrespective of background. The wealthy were frightened by the prospect of the lower classes spreading disease, committing both petty and violent crimes, and even inciting political insurrection. The Duke of Wellington called for the cavalry to be in attendance at the Great Exhibition, which Prince Albert ultimately declined. The compromise was that undercover police were instructed to pose as guides to spy on poorer visitors and report back if they were behaving incorrectly. Of course, there were no outbreaks of insurrections or endemics at the Great Exhibition.
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