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Arcadia

Arcadia serves humanity by preserving endangered cultural heritage and ecosystems.

We protect complexity and work against the entropy of ravaged and thereby starkly simplified natural environments and globalized cultures. Innovation and change occur best in already complex systems. Once memories, knowledge, skills, variety, and intricacy disappear – once the old complexities are lost – they are hard to replicate or replace. Arcadia aims to return to people both their memories and their natural surroundings. What we want to preserve remains fragile, small and dispersed. But if we do not protect it – if it vanishes forever – then future generations will have no base from which to build a vibrant, resilient, green future.

Because knowledge should belong to all, we also promote open access, seeking to make information available without barriers of cost or distance. Charities, businesses, universities, schools, the media, politicians, and citizens all benefit when research and data are no longer locked behind paywalls or reserved for those who live near their repositories. The economy benefits too from better-informed decisions, improved schooling and knowledgeable citizens, from enhanced academic research and innovation based on shared knowledge.

We do not accept applications, but seek and support organizations run by exceptional individuals, operating in a cost-effective, scientifically sound, and ethical manner that share our vision.

Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin

Funder Website

Arcadia Projects

EAP839 Gallery 001

Endangered Urdu periodicals: further preservation and access for vulnerable scholarly resources

This project digitised six series of Urdu periodicals and newspapers housed in three libraries in Pakistan, continuing the work started in the previous project EAP566. These t…

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EAP838 DGCAF GN A I 170

Digitisation of the photographic collection from DirghaMan and GaneshMan Chitrakar Art Foundation

The DirghaMan and GaneshMan Chitrakar Art Foundation has a total of 1,800 glass plate negatives and 4,000 acetate negatives. At a time when most people did not have access to …

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EAP835 Pub002 0

Jaffna Protestant digital archive project

The Tamil Protestant community of the Jaffna Peninsula has left an indelible mark on Sri Lanka’s modern history. These sources contribute to how we understand ritual, textual,…

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EAP833 Pub001

Safeguarding the fragile collection of the private archive of the Lazić family

The Lazić family counts six generations of librarians. The family collection is open for public consultation, which puts the material at great risk of deterioration. The digit…

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Eap 823

Digitisation and preservation of the manuscript collection at the Monastery of St Saviour in Old Jerusalem

This project digitised the full collection of manuscripts at the Franciscan monastery of St Saviour in the Old City of Jerusalem. The collection contains codices and rotuli, d…

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EAP821 DSR00020 01

Documentary heritage at risk: digitisation and enhancement of the archive of the Monastery of Dominican nuns of Santa Rosa, Santiago, Chile

The Archive of the Dominican Monastery of Santa Rosa is one of the four oldest archives of female writing in Chile. With few exceptions, women's testimonies have not been pres…

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EAP 816

Selective digitisation and preservation of the photographic archive of the Vasile Parvan Institute of Archaeology, Bucharest, Romania

The Vasile Parvan Institute of Archaeology in Romania holds thousands of photographic materials. The archive is a source of information for archaeological research and monumen…

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EAP810 Pub003

Conservation, documentation and preservation of the knowledge of siddha medicine

Siddha refers to the traditional medical system of Tamil Nadu, India. Although recognised by the government of India, siddha medicine has not been systemically studied, partly…

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EAP796 Pub001

Collection, preservation, documentation & digitisation of ethnic recordings made in India in the acoustic recording process on shellac 78rpm gramophone records

This project catalogued and digitised musical performances on rare 78rpm records from collections in southern India. The main source of the recordings was the Gramophone Museu…

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