“The Age of Discoveries”—At What Price?
By Awake! correspondent in Spain
“LOOK what I’ve found!” cries the little girl, holding a beautiful butterfly. Grown-ups also like to show off their most recent discoveries.
And where better to do that than at a universal exposition, or world’s fair? From April 20 to October 12, 1992, Seville, in southern Spain, hosted the last and the largest world’s fair of this century, dubbed Expo ’92.
The theme of Expo ’92 was “The Age of Discoveries,” so the participants endeavored to portray their role in mankind’s discoveries both past and present. The visitor was afforded a unique opportunity to discover the cuisine, the folklore, the architecture, and the technology of 111 countries of the world.
In recent years, however, a darker side to discovery has emerged. An unpleasant by-product of many discoveries has been the devastation of earth’s fragile environment. Just as a little girl may damage the delicate wings of a butterfly, so the irresponsible use of technology may do irreparable damage to our planet.
Thus, as the Expo’92 Official Guide explained, the goal was not merely to offer “a tribute to Mankind’s capacity for discovery” but also to promote the international solidarity needed in order to protect our fragile planet.
“The World on an Island”
Seville, the host city, grew rich in the golden age of discovery. Christopher Columbus sailed from Seville on his second great voyage of discovery. During the 16th century, most of the gold and silver from the Americas was shipped by Spanish galleons to Seville. The bullion—the main incentive for many early explorers—was unloaded at the Torre del Oro (Tower of Gold), one of the city’s famous landmarks.
Recently, however, money has been flowing out rather than pouring in. In the last five years, ten billion dollars has been spent preparing the Andalusian metropolis for Expo ’92. What has all that cash created?
La Cartuja, an alluvial island created by the Guadalquivir River on the outskirts of Seville, was the site of an old monastery and a run-down porcelain factory. It was transformed into an enormous theme park, complete with tree-lined avenues, gardens, canals, covered walkways, and shiny pavilions, all of which have been linked to the city by several graceful bridges. The king of Spain, Juan Carlos I, described the new La Cartuja as “the world on an island, and an island for the world.” What sort of world did visitors to Expo ’92 discover?
Expo ’92 seemed to emphasize culture, cuisine, and entertainment as much as technological wizardry. Writer César Alonso observed: “In Expo’92, we have moved on from an optimistic cult of Progress towards a watchful wariness about mere scientific or technical achievements.” Furthermore, the participation of a record number of smaller countries also gave the exhibition a human rather than a technological face.
The diverse pavilions offered those who may never have the chance to visit faraway countries a glimpse of such countries’ beauty, people, and history. Dramatic tribal dances from New Zealand and Papua New Guinea competed with lively Russian folk dancing, Spanish sevillanas, and graceful Indonesian rhythms for the visitors’ attention. Operatic productions, fireworks displays, and street entertainers added a further colorful note.
Discoveries Past and Present
The visitor could see how much the world has changed in the last five centuries. An exhibition in La Cartuja’s restored monastery showed what life was like in 1492—not just in Europe but also in the Americas, the Orient, and the Islamic world. At that time those four regions were like enormous islands cut off from one another by oceans, deserts, or distrust.
But above all, Expo ’92 aimed to be environment friendly. For the first time at an international exposition, conservation was high on the agenda. A three-dimensional documentary film explained how recent discoveries—such as the hole in the ozone layer—have highlighted man-made threats to our planet. The Pavilion of the Environment analyzed the problem of balancing economic growth with conservation, and the Pavilion of Nature, which housed a small-scale model of the Amazon rain forest, stressed the vulnerability of this priceless heritage.
In one of Europe’s major gardening projects, 30,000 trees and 300,000 shrubs were planted on La Cartuja Island. The goal was to beautify the exhibition site and to communicate the message that discovery should not lead to destruction of our environment. Red and yellow water lilies vied for space with a sophisticated communications satellite, while jacaranda trees blossomed beneath the inevitable monorail, and spacious green lawns masked a complex fiber-optic communications system.
Many pavilions evoked traditional architecture and were striking, either in form or in construction material. The Japanese pavilion was claimed to be the world’s largest wooden building, while the Swiss built an airy tower out of paper. Morocco constructed an Arabian palace, and the United Arab Emirates a minicastle. The facade of New Zealand’s pavilion was a rocky cliff complete with a waterfall and a realistic-looking colony of squawking sea birds, while India’s wooden pavilion was crowned with an enormous peacock’s tail.
Keeping cool is always a problem during the sultry Sevillian summer. The Expo organizers sought to remedy the problem the natural way, using the time-honored methods of the Moors who inhabited Seville centuries ago. Numerous fountains and artificial clouds of water droplets combined with trees, shrubs, and shaded walkways to make the heat more tolerable.
“The Greatest Discovery of Our Time”
Before Columbus set out on his first voyage, he stayed in the old monastery on La Cartuja. His voyage heralded the age of discovery that the exposition celebrated. But despite five centuries of progress in many fields, mankind looks to the future with growing concern. King Juan Carlos I pointed out that “collective aspirations and optimism depend fundamentally on dialogue among nations, mutual understanding.”
For that reason Expo ’92 sought to “extend a message of peace, good neighbourliness and solidarity to all the inhabitants of our . . . planet Earth”—not an easy goal in view of the chronically divided world. As the Official Guide recognized, “a new world order based on these principles would, indeed, be the greatest discovery of our time.”
[Picture on page 17]
Seville’s famous 13th-century Torre del Oro (Tower of Gold)
[Picture on page 18]
Water lilies vie for space with a communications satellite exhibit
[Picture on page 18]
The Moroccan Pavilion echoes the style of a Moorish palace