The Brussels World Exposition Expo 58 – and particularly the Czechoslovak participation in the event has attained a legendary status in the Czech consciousness and the story of the sweeping success of the Czech representation is one of the pivotal points in the country’s history after the war from which the re-established national self-esteem originated. Although a real awareness of the actual event is fading away.
In the post-war history of Czechoslovakia it was one of the first presentations of the country outside the Iron Curtain which, in its consequences, helped disintegrate the political and cultural barriers. To some, mentioning Expo 58 or the Brussels Style will conjure up the wonderful success of the Czechoslovak exhibition, the Magic Lantern, the first impulse towards opening to the West. Many will bring to mind a modern decorative style springing from the cosmic Sputnik euphoria which was followed by bizarre applications of plastic, characteristic diagonal elements, and organic forms. Today, the numbers of those directly involved and eyewitnesses are rapidly diminishing; the original buildings from Brussels, then dismantled and proudly re-erected, have in the meantime been destroyed or radically rebuilt. In spite of the perpetual attractiveness of the Brussels phenomenon it largely escaped closer attention on the part of experts. And so, fifty years on, it is time to examine Expo 58 as it really was and assess its importance with regards to its artistic, sociological, political and cultural aspects. An occasion to do this is provided both by an exhibition as a multi-media presentation and an accompanying publication.
