A multiday, citywide festival recently took place across San Francisco, ringing in the country’s 250th birthday with a forward-thinking, imaginative approach to the future. San Francisco-based civic arts and sciences nonprofit The Plenary Co. was at the helm of the project, alongside the Svane Family Foundation, a major supporter of the arts in San Francisco; Metta Fund, a nonprofit focused on quality of life for aging San Franciscans; and Nothin But Hits, a collective of culture curators. Not mentioned are the event partners through which many of the events were conducted or held.
Featuring an egalitarian approach to the hosts’ relationships to participants defined as “co-creating,” 30 partners hosted over 50 events across the city from July 4–12. The events were defined by four separate categories: Green Futures, Social Futures, Science and Tech Futures, and Media Futures, exploring possibilities within these categories as we witness and guide the merging of technology with art, medicine, nature, and cultural practices. Within these categories were a host of events, almost all NOTAFLOF (no one turned away for lack of funds), ranging from discussions about the future of sex or pancakes to activities from dance classes to diorama building, with a string of showcases, educational games, performances, and talks in between.
I was able to attend a few of the over 50 events, which consisted of using AI to generate the content of a podcast for the future at SFMOMA, playing a fantasy role play game centered around affordable housing at The FAIGHT Collective, and creating an optimistic timeline from now to 2045 in the Miraloma Park area at the neighborhood’s clubhouse, as well as the events kickoff at the headquarters, The Pearl, in the Dogpatch.
The kickoff featured two art exhibitions and a rooftop cadre of performances from musical to slam-poetic. Artworks evoked an Art-Deco-cum-neo-folk-art illustrative aesthetic. One featured nature, medical technology, and global citizens, portraying an idealized society in which technological possibilities and a realignment with Earth’s patterns will be harnessed by us and for us. The other was akin to a tarot deck, with cards like The Magician being replaced with future hierarchical roles like Civic Designer, an archetype one may find in a world where AI may absorb some jobs, but people will still be needed for expertise in “culture and experience design,” as the wall text denoted per this future archetype.
the hubs, facilitate gatherings, set the tone. They honor the lineages of how stories get
told and who gets to tell them. They’re the experts in culture and experience design
making spaces work, senses sing, and people feel like they belong. | Taylor Snowberger for The Voice
For what it was, The Future of Us was a beautifully done civic experiment.
Text accompanying art exhibits and explaining activities was decidedly optimistic but carefully balanced with acknowledgments of our collective general weariness, and it seemed that this tone defined much of the events’ design and curation — a nuanced approach to society’s apprehension, with the target audience being artists, creatives, intellectuals, tech innovators, and scientists with an eye on protecting humanity. While expertly avoiding the patronizing Polly-Anna-ishness that can pervade discussions of the future, and distinctly not avoiding the difficult circumstances plaguing Americans in the year of our lord 2026, an air of tightly controlled language still pervaded.
The website itself is the platonic ideal of an event website, with each event featuring a profile for the event planner with their favorite songs, personal websites, short bios, and a description of the event they’re hosting. The descriptions for the purpose of the event and the precision in its gargantuan architecture, carefully sourced social research, and pastel execution were formidable if not a little overwhelming in their scope.
For what it was, The Future of Us was a beautifully done civic experiment. It was not meant to replace the organic chaos of events that define urban left-of-center art hubs, like, say, Santa-Con, or the Trans March, or an opening for an exhibition full of local home-grown artists, but to show what happens when the ghost of corporate culture takes over the chaos of society with carefully planned, precisely curated events.