Colonial Propaganda - How to show and how to question?
The Panorama of the Congo by Paul Mathieu and Alfred Bastien (1913) is a prime example of 20th-century colonial propaganda. It was produced to convince the Belgians to colonise and invest in the Congo, promoting a positive colony image without any signs of violence reported in European newspapers. Due to its controversial nature, it was kept hidden for almost a century. Its current exhibition at MUHNAC raises questions and sparks a debate that extends to other propaganda images that are still kept, particularly in Portugal. These issues will be addressed by historian Matthew G. Stanard (Berry College, Georgia, USA), a specialist in European colonial propaganda, and discussed by historian Miguel Bandeira Jerónimo (Univ. Coimbra), as well as the exhibition curators Victor Flores (Univ. Lusófona) and Linda King (IADT, Dublin).