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The Future Starts Here
100 projects shaping the world of tomorrow
This show is stimulating, inspiring, exciting and challenging
Times
From smart appliances to satellites, artificial intelligence to internet culture, this exhibition brings together more than 100 objects as a landscape of possibilities for the near future.
Exhibition Trailer
Supported by
The Volkswagen Group is a proud partner of The Future Starts Here at the V&A. In aiming to become a world-leading provider of sustainable mobility and driver of digital transformation, we know that innovation needs inspiration. The arts and culture are integral elements of a vibrant society and generate perspectives for its continual development. Therefore we support the arts in unfolding their power to inspire creativity worldwide.
Exhibition Highlights
Anthropocene spike, a golden spike driven into a rockface to mark the beginning of the Anthropocene geological era. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Seismic: 'Electric muscles for the elderly', Aura-powered bodysuits, Yves Behar. Courtesy of Seismic
Tomás Saraceno for Aerocene Foundation, Aerocene, launches at White Sands (NM, United States), 2015. Courtesy Aerocene Foundation. Photography by Studio Tomás Saraceno, 2015. Licensed under CC by Aerocene Foundation 4.0
Technology in Bed: 'Alone together', Hanif Shoaei, 2014. Courtesy of Hanif Shoaei
Body Code Animation: 'Visualising the code of life', Drew Berry, The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research. © E.O.Wilson Biodiversity Foundation
Protei: 'An autonomous ship that cleans oil spills', 2014. © Scoutbots LTD, Cesar Jung-Harada
Radical Love, DNA portrait of Chelsea Manning, by Heather Dewey-Hagborg, 2015. Courtesy of Heather Dewey-Hagborg and Fridman Gallery, New York City
betamodel, Bento Labs: 'A home DNA lab'. © Bento Bioworks
Shooting Stars project: 'Shooting stars on demand', Ale and Co Ltd, 2016. © ALE Co. Ltd
Luchtsingel: 'A pedestrian bridge crowdfunded by citizens', ZUS, 2011 – 2015, Rotterdam. Photography: Ossip van Duivenbode. © ZUS
Living Network: 'A world wide web of trees', Jalila Essaidi. © BioArt Laboratories
Masdar City: 'The world's first carbon-neutral, zero-waste city', Foster + Partners. Photography by Eteienne Malapert, 2014. © Etienne Malapert, The city of Possibilities, Ecal
More to Do
Past Events
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About The Future Starts Here exhibition
Find out more about our 2018 blockbuster exhibition
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Interview with DeepMind – Google's AI research lab
Teaching artificially intelligent 'agents’ to play classic 1980s Atari videogames
Project focus | Adrian Lahoud: Climate Crimes
Visualising the flow of aerosol emissions and its subsequent impact on rainfall in the Sahel region of Africa
Designing futures: an ethics of the possible by Arjun Appadurai
What is the role of design in shaping peoples' futures?
Project focus | Cryonics: who wants to live forever?
Freezing human bodies to be re-awoken in the future when we have 'solved death'
Project focus | Miranda July: 'I'm The President, Baby'
Using smart curtains as storytelling devices
Project focus | Jonas Staal: New World Summit – Rojava
Developing parliaments with and for stateless states, autonomist groups, and blacklisted political organisations
Big Glass Microphone digital commission by Stamen Design
Discover a world of fascinating detections through the Big Glass Microphone
Exhibition shop
The Future Starts Here
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The Future Starts Here tote bag
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We are all connected, but are we still lonely? Digital print
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Friday Late - WTFUTURE Friday 29 June
Can imagining alternative tomorrows influence today’s choices? Investigating speculative and imagined worlds to reveal possibilities for the future - from artists looking forwards to heal the scars of the past, to designers using science fiction to interrupt reality.
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The Future Starts Here
Background image: The Future Starts Here, 2018. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London