His proposal was accepted and on February 26 of this year, the anniversary of the completion of the Global Seed Vault, he had the opportunity of visiting the vault at the invitation of the Norwegian government. The symbolic sculpture was attached to the wall of the tunnel in front of the vault in a place called the Svalbard Tube, at the point where the tunnel moving straight in from the entrance meets another tunnel crossing it at right angles. The temperature at the site is four degrees below zero. It is a place that people pass whenever they take seeds in or out. The sculpture is 120 centimeters long and, like most of Tanabe's other sculptures, made of stainless steel. The title is The Seed 2009 Momi - In - Situ Conservation. It advocates the importance of the idea of in-situ conservation, which represents a very different approach to the preservation of plant species than the seed vault. Tanabe believes that both approaches are necessary. They must be used in tandem, like two wheels on the same vehicle, in order to assure continued food production and crop diversity.
This vault is managed jointly by GCDT, the Nordic Genetic Resource Center (Nor Gen), and the Norwegian government. The project was first conceived 20 years ago in response to the nuclear power plant accident at Chernobyl, which occurred in April 1986. One is amazed at this realistic venture in crisis management designed to deal with the dangers posed by nuclear power by the country in charge of the Nobel Peace Prize. The installation of Tanabe's sculpture is an artistic contribution to this effort by a Japanese artist, a person from Asia. Contributions within a professional field are important, but assistant from outside the field is also appreciated in a field like this. Art cannot solve any of these problems, but it makes it possible for the person who sees it to gain a comprehensive understanding in an instant.