An exhibition titled «Utopia, the quest of the ideal society in the Western world» is running until July 9th 2000 at the French National library in Paris.
This exhibition has been centring on Sir Thomas More's book «Libellus Vere Aureus Utopia» published in 1516.
Sir Thomas More's presence has been enlightened by his portrait painted by Hans Holbein in 1526, which has been loaned by the Royal Library of Windsor while the exhibition is after all devoted to the significance or the interpretation of utopia.
Some extraordinary pieces are being shown at the French National Library such as a map purportedly used by Christopher Columbus when he sailed to America. The representation of the world during the 16th Century had much to do with utopia as suggested by many pictures, maps and books and the obvious role of architecture throughout the centuries.
Utopia was an idealistic philosophy aimed at improving man's life and many architects tried to design buildings and factories in that sense. Most interesting are Supremacist works of the 1920s which strangely marked the end of utopia while dangerous ideologies made their way during the 1930s. People are now conscious that utopia is a pious wish and are opposing good sense to madness.
Meanwhile Thomas More's book meet immediate best seller after its release. It was then published in Latin 24 times between 1516 and 1689 and was translated in German in 1524, French in 1550, English in 1551, Dutch in 1553 and Spanish in 1637. For the first time in the Christian world someone was dealing with happiness and perfection through possible terrestrial means with real men though not perfect.
More invented the island of Utopia with simple words in a humorous way describing an ideal country with men and women living happily with no money nor jewels sharing all their belongings and needs. Friendship was the supreme value and everything was done to prevent pride and competition while all religious beliefs and even divorce could be accepted.
More even designed a map of the fantasy island and even an alphabet for its inhabitants but it is obvious that he was much influenced by the discovery of America almost a quarter of a century earlier. Still, while writing his book, he had no illusions about the state of the world and knew that utopia was simply a dream. He however had references with the Garden of Eden from the Bible and the Olympus of Roman and Greek times but was probably the first philosopher to describe an ideal world as the exhibition tends to suggest with books by Campanella (The Sun City of 1623), Saint Simon, Fourier and Karl Marx. The latter referred somewhat to utopia in his «German Ideology» when he stated that he believed that people should be free to do what they liked. Finally this exhibition serves to demonstrate that people now live in an era where ideologies belong to the past whereas they are prone to fight for new values, such as environment, peace, leisure and a better life. In some way this is a new kind of utopia.
Home
