Forecasting the future was the mandate during last week’s WIRED25, our second annual ideas festival. Onstage, tech executives and scientists hashed out plans for a better tomorrow, while offstage attendees discussed what those days ahead could look like. Instagram’s chief product officer told the audience it might be a good idea to stop obsessing over how many likes other people get, while scientists from Memphis Meats detailed ways people can be better stewards to the planet by eating meat grown in a laboratory from cells. Alongside these big ideas were also small moments of creativity, like young minds molding slime, building paper airplanes, and workshopping their own science-fiction worlds. When she wasn’t making portraits of the event’s luminaries, photographer Dina Litovsky roamed the Commonwealth Club and captured some of the moments that may have inspired budding geniuses to unlock the next future-bending idea. See what she saw below.
Levi Draheim, Kelsey Juliana, and Vic Barrett are three of the youth plaintiffs suing the US government for perpetuating climate change.Photograph: Dina Litovsky
Earth’s mightiest defenders both onscreen and off: Captain America (Chris Evans, right) meets Kelsey Juliana, Levi Draheim, and Vic Barrett. Photograph: Dina Litovsky
WIRED’s editor in chief Nicholas Thompson.Photograph: Dina Litovsky
What looks like a normal file cabinet actually contains American datasets in which black people are either under- or overrepresented.Photograph: Dina Litovsky
Do you like the scent on one of these fabric swatches? According to this experiment’s designers, that may mean you’d be a good match with the person who wore the shirt it came from.Photograph: Dina Litovsky
Back-to-back-to-back Hugo Award-winning author N.K. Jemisin led attendees through a workshop on how to build literary worlds.Photograph: Dina Litovsky
The sky’s the limit when it’s John M. Collins, better known as The Paper Airplane Guy, giving you tips on how to crease and tuck your creations.Photograph: Dina Litovsky
Saturday’s slime workshop proved popular with the younger set…Photograph: Dina Litovsky
… but not so much with the TSA agents who found this goo in carry-ons afterwards.Photograph: Dina Litovsky
Don’t let parents and screen-time limits hold you back, kid. Look close, it’s the future.Photograph: Dina Litovsky
