Elena Manferdini begins the event by introducing the first speaker, Dr. Claire Isabel Webb, of the “Future humans” project at the Berggruen Institute.

0:05:14. Perceiving. Webb discusses technologies of perception both old and new, stressing how both facilitated new senses of self, and new ways of relating to nature. In the category of virtual objects, Webb compares the virtual object produced by Galileo’s telescope, to the virtual embodiment of VR avatars. In the category of simulations, she juxtaposes the cinematic frieze of Paleolithic cave paintings at Cougnac with the immersive urban military training environments at Fort Irwin National Training Center in San Bernardino County. Webb concludes by asking, “How will you invent new technologies of visual perception to disclose richer topographies of reality?

0:26:05. Imaging. Zeina Koreitem discusses a shift in architecture from drawing to imaging and from representation to presentation. She discusses computer graphics by stressing pre-personal computer computational images by Stan Venderbeek. She describes her own design work in terms of “optical spaces” that “dream of being images, not because they won’t be inhabited…but because that dream brings them closer to contemporary culture …”

0:39:18. Worldmaking. Damjan Jovanovic discusses his visual game simulation “Planet garden,” part of the Liam Young’s “Views of Planet City” exhibitions, as a argument for abundance, and the possibility of creating a “Good Anthropocene”. He characterizes it as an experiment in worldmaking, i.e. “employing video game technologies and artificial intelligence to explore new ways of modeling and perception.”

0:56:18. Building. M. Casey Rehm discusses how AI figures in his design practice and in SCI-Arc’s curriculum, focusing specifically on the models employed for perception, generation, and mediation of the built environment, i.e. a map that identifies opportunities for densification and redevelopment in Los Angeles, digitally printed terrazzo, a 3D printed chair produced by ClipGliding gaussian spatting, and agential interfaces as co-participants in the built environment.

1:16:42. Jacklilin Hah Bloom moderates a conversation between the panelists, on a range of topics, including defining limits, perspective, memory, history, and new approaches to the past.