After Winka Dubbeldam’s introduction, Nathan Hume reflects on how he found himself in Los Angeles, at SCI-Arc, after living in New York City for twenty years. More generally, he reflects on how architecture culture got to where it is now. Citing Duchamp, he refers to this stocktaking as “clearing ones desk”. He offers, “No answers, only questions.”

He asks what were the crucial inflection points since the late 1990s were. His response includes …
• Publications: Ray Gun magazine (1992-2000), Wallpaper* magazine (1996- ). “Diagram diaries” (1999), “The Un-private house” (1999), Log magazine (2003- ), Project journal (2011-8)
• Exhibitions: Mood river (2002), Latent utopias (2002), Matters of sensation (2008), Possible mediums (2019)
• Public discussions such as the ANY annual conference series (1991-2001)
• Competitions such as the MOMA/P. S. 1 Young Architects Program (1998-2019)

Hume stresses how pro-architecture pre-2008 crash culture was, with architectural debates covered by the newspapers, architects functioning as celebrities, and a system of competitions that regularly led to innovative buildings getting built by young practitioners.

Though 9/11 and the 2008 crash ended that earlier optimism, he finds all the elements for a new, better-grounded positive spirit in architecture in the faculty and students of SCI-Arc.
At 1:07:44 he presents a quick and compressed survey of his own design and built work, concluding, “If we keep going, and accept Now for what it is, we can start working on it rather than waiting for it to happen.”