Gallery of Peoples
Performing Nationality
The Agricultural Exhibit served, among other purposes, as a site for defining Soviet ethnicity. In the wake of the 1939 census, ethnic groups with fluid identities were constrained by state norms of culture and territory. Identity-based pavilions became stages on which guests performed group identities; a lavishly produced photo book captured non-Slavic groups in "native" costumes and poses.
The Pavilions of the Agricultural Exhibit
Architecture was one of the Agricultural Exhibit's chief spectacles. Modernist architects built stone-clad showcases for the ethnic republics in the 1930s; postwar reconstruction shifted the emphasis from national culture to Soviet economic glorification. The severe Ukrainian Pavilion was rebuilt as an ornate agricultural showcase. Other buildings celebrated heavy industry, mechanization, and the collective farm.
