Though many studies have examined the relationship between the Japanese Empire and its colonies, few have addressed the exotic gaze which urban dwellers cast upon the colonized. Therefore, this paper aims to explore the relationship between the Japanese people and the exhibited colonial other. Through official colonial exhibitions, the Japanese authorities attempted to ‘guide’ the Japanese subjects’ view of the colonized. Meanwhile, newspaper reports covering two colonial exhibitions - held in 1903 and in 1912 - reflect the way in which Japanese patrons saw the colonized. This paper will show how hegemonic colonial ideas propagated by the colonial authorities were reinterpreted by the common people. In 1903, eight years after the First Sino-Japanese War, in the Fifth National Industrial Exhibition, the Taiwan Governor General’s Office attempted to present the island as the “honor of the Empire.” At first, consistent with the expectations of the exhibition’s organizers, Japanese patrons appeared to be in awe of the main attraction, namely the Taiwan Pavilion. However, it seemed that for many Japanese patrons, the most attractive “exhibits” were not those that had been prepared by the colonial government, but the waitresses in a Taiwanese café and restaurant that had been set up by private Japanese businessmen. Instead of seeing Taiwan as an island full of natural resources - which had been the original intention of the exhibition’s organizers - the Japanese patrons cast a very different gaze upon the colonized. The Colonization Exhibition in 1912 was held with the purpose of showcasing Japan’ s various political and economic accomplishments in its colonies, in order to attract private investors. However, the attention of Japanese audiences was drawn by an aboriginal Taiwanese tour group that had traveled to Japan upon the invitation of colonial authorities.They were not a part of the official exhibition, but were viewed by most Japanese people as a part of it, and they became the focus of the Japanese media. This small group of Taiwanese indigenous people came to represent Japan’s popular imagination of the Empire’s civilizing mission in a savage, tropical land. All in all, Japanese patrons of these exhibitions did not see the whole colony, as if the Empire’s understanding of the colony was also a partial one. Their limited understanding thus helped to construct the cultural edifice of the Japanese colonial empire. However the gap between the Empire’s expectations and people’s perceptions of the colony remained.
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