In analyzing the 1989 bicentennial in Paris, my point of departure has been that the French government, faced with the cool reception to the memory of the Revolution of 1789, was trying to make revolutionary heritage relevant to contemporary concerns, by using allegorical techniques of spatializing and visualizing history while consequently (yet paradoxically, since it ran against their intentions) effecting a smooth passage for this heritage into the world of commodity and spectacle. To analyze this dilemma, I investigated the mechanisms of representation and the tension between spectacle and politically engaged imagery. Drawing from the work of Water Benjamin, the thesis proposed to use allegory as a mode of political criticism and redemptive interpretation. The analysis of the programming of events, for example, revealed that it contained a moral tale of sacrifice, and praised the power of the memory of the Revolution to form a community, not based on ethnicity or shared history but on shared ideals. The analysis of the use of collage in the Bastille Day Parade revealed that it reworked Republican notions of ‘fraternity in a post-colonial era to reflect contemporary discussions of métissage and take a position on its relationship to democracy. By looking at this commemoration allegorically, the double meanings inscribed in the bicentennial program, exhibits, monuments and parade can be unpacked. But the allegorical critique is violent, it does not carefully excavate layers of meaning through a gentle and constructive hermeneutic circle, it requires that the objects that are being contemplated be in fragments. As the allegorist reassembles the fragments into new meaningful constellations, the constructions remain open, driven by the impossibility of recovering what has been lost, always pointing to the instability of meaning. The analysis of the commemoration recognized that commodification and spectacularisation happen, but through reversal it also showed that the 1989 bicentennial draws from a constantly evolving relationship to memory which allows for investment on the part of the public. Because the commemoration is a powerful form of visualizing and spatializing history that occurs in public spaces, many provocative images were taken up by the press and written about, which ultimately reconfigured present-day discussions about democracy and citizenship.

In analyzing the 1989 bicentennial in Paris, my point of departure has been that the French government, faced with the cool reception to the memory of the Revolution of 1789, was trying to make revolutionary heritage relevant to contemporary concerns, by using allegorical techniques of spatializing and visualizing history while consequently (yet paradoxically, since it ran against their intentions) effecting a smooth passage for this heritage into the world of commodity and spectacle. To analyze this dilemma, I investigated the mechanisms of representation and the tension between spectacle and politically engaged imagery. Drawing from the work of Water Benjamin, the thesis proposed to use allegory as a mode of political criticism and redemptive interpretation. The analysis of the programming of events, for example, revealed that it contained a moral tale of sacrifice, and praised the power of the memory of the Revolution to form a community, not based on ethnicity or shared history but on shared ideals. The analysis of the use of collage in the Bastille Day Parade revealed that it reworked Republican notions of ‘fraternity in a post-colonial era to reflect contemporary discussions of métissage and take a position on its relationship to democracy. By looking at this commemoration allegorically, the double meanings inscribed in the bicentennial program, exhibits, monuments and parade can be unpacked. But the allegorical critique is violent, it does not carefully excavate layers of meaning through a gentle and constructive hermeneutic circle, it requires that the objects that are being contemplated be in fragments. As the allegorist reassembles the fragments into new meaningful constellations, the constructions remain open, driven by the impossibility of recovering what has been lost, always pointing to the instability of meaning. The analysis of the commemoration recognized that commodification and spectacularisation happen, but through reversal it also showed that the 1989 bicentennial draws from a constantly evolving relationship to memory which allows for investment on the part of the public. Because the commemoration is a powerful form of visualizing and spatializing history that occurs in public spaces, many provocative images were taken up by the press and written about, which ultimately reconfigured present-day discussions about democracy and citizenship. / Arts, Faculty of / Geography, Department of / Graduate