Time Capsule

“Libraries are still the best way to preserve the important aspects of man’s written inheritance for the future,” says the Belgian artist Louis de Cordier. “Not DVDs, hard disks, chips or the internet.” He bought a piece of land at 2,000 meters in the Spanish Sierra Nevada and built an underground library and a seed bank for non-genetically modified plants. The remote location, the minimal variations in temperature and the dry climate delay the ravages of time. The books on art, science and spirituality that he aims to preserve for the next 2,000 years are his own selection, but anyone can send him books. In this isolated location where time seems to stand still, a radio telescope picks up signals of cosmic activity from the beginnings of the universe. From this height you can also see the vast greenhouse complexes along the coast, where illegal immigrants earn a meager living. Their daily drudgery contrasts starkly with the telescope’s vast outlook and the library’s focus on a distant future.