ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the ways in which an early twentieth-century contingent of Chinese state and commercial elites, presents a Chinese nation at a series of national and international expositions held between 1904 and 1915, and discusses among diverse communities with interests in how "China" was construed at these events. It describes a sequence of Chinese exposition projects over approximately a decade at the start of the twentieth century, beginning with Chinese participation in the St. Louis Louisiana Purchase International Exposition of 1904, a project overseen by the Qing dynasty's Maritime Customs Service. China's involvement in its own national displays began in 1873, as European and American employees of the Qing Dynasty's Imperial Customs Service served as managers of Chinese presentations at the Vienna World's Fair. The position of the Chinese nation and its representation in a global arena was also threatened, a problem Chen Qi and Chen Huide framed almost poetically in an invocation of cultural icons.
