Modernist Dialogues and Confrontations: Polish Presence at the Levant Fair 1932–1936

Poland participated in the Levant Fair organized between 1932 and 1936, and this participation was significant each time. The Polish presence at the Levant Fair in confrontation with the proposals of other countries, including the hosts of the fair, gives rise to the discourse on modern architecture introduced into urban space and its role in the state propaganda (national versus international styles) as well as on modern exhibition design in Jewish Palestine of the British Mandate, in relation to culture, economy and trade.

During the two editions of the Levantine Fair, a significant change took place in the architecture of Polish pavilions. Even in 1932, the one and the only Polish pavilion had the shape of a highlander hut with a steep roof in so-called Zakopane-style. It in a way confirmed the vernacular and national tendencies present in the Polish architecture of the previous decade.

Although situation changed in 1934, when the British Mandate authorities decided to erect a permanent fair infrastructure. The Polish exhibition in three modern pavilions and several smaller kiosks occupied the second largest - after Great Britain - exhibition area of 1,100 m². The designer of the entire exhibition and the architecture of two of the three pavilions was Władysław Lichtenstein, an esteemed, though little-known Jewish architect and interior designer from Łódź. The main pavilion was designed by the chief architect of the Levant Fair, Arieh El-Hanani.

Freshly reborn Polish state was actively involved in the organization of Polish participation in the Levant Fair, preparing appropriate visual campaigns. High government officials attended the opening ceremonies. Preparations for participation in subsequent editions of the Fair, and then reports on the course of them, including the reception of Polish exhibitions, were described by the journal "Palestine and the Middle East", a body of the Polish-Palestinian Chamber of Commerce.