This is an email from How We Get To Next.
Introducing our newest series: “A Visual History of the Future”
Skies full of personal flying vehicles, robotic servants, and mail carriers with jetpacks. Decades ago, artists’ imaginings formed high expectations about the world to come. Were these just fantasies—or was it the work of pioneers whose visions of the future actually helped to shape it?
A few years ago, Next editor Duncan Geere and I were thinking about how to illustrate an article. We had a general concept for it: a futuristic class of pupils learning how their ancestors used archaic sources of fuel in the 21st century, while out a window clean energy powered a utopian city.
Looking for inspiration, I stumbled across a fantastic image from 1958 (you can see my homage here). The series it came from, Arthur Radeburgh’s “Closer Than You Think,” was unknown to me, and a few hours later I emerged from a deep rabbit hole full of futurist images and ideas.
That rabbit hole led to our newest series, “A Visual History of the Future,” which begins this month. It’s a different kind of series for How We Get to Next — instead of looking at the innovations of today, or those we think we’ll see in the decades to come, we’ll be looking at perceptions of the future from the past.
“A Visual History of the Future” will explore how imagery in advertising, magazines, and other media has been used to inspire, sell, and build our ideas of the future. We’ll look at everything from the home to infrastructure to the cities we live in—at ideas that ranged from the insightful to the absurd. And we’ll be looking at the times in which these images were created: what was happening in the world that formed “the future” of that time?
When we celebrate progress, we often talk about scientists, engineers, and designers who developed theories or built tangible things. Artists are often overlooked, and their contributions—the production, visualization and distribution of ideas—are less tangible. This series will shine a light on these creators and how they reached the audiences of the day.
If you want to follow along, be sure to subscribe to the How We Get to Next newsletter. Every Thursday we share links to our new episodes, our favorite stuff from around the web, and original writing from our editors.
The future isn’t what it used to be. I can’t wait for you all to see it.
