Back in the late 1800s/early 1900s, Jean-Marc Côté and other French artists were asked to produce their depictions of what life might look like in the year 2000.
These images were then printed and handed out in cigarette packets around the time of the 1900 World’s Fair in Paris, which must have been a real treat when you opened up your pack of smokes. Probably led to some good swap meets at the fair too. They were later turned into postcards.
As you can imagine, many of the strange pictures depicted life in the future with weird mechanised devices and flying, and whilst we can fly now the reality doesn’t really look like any of these bizarre drawings from the past. There also seems to be a healthy obsession with an exploration under the sea and interaction with marine life, whereas space travel is almost non existent. Maybe we’re exploring the wrong areas today?
Anyway, it’s safe to say that all these pictures are completely weird and a novel reminder of where people thought we were going to be 1000 years from now. If only stuff like the robot barber and one man orchestra actually existed now – the world really would be a better place.
(Click the arrows below to navigate through the slides.)
