Future Cities Wellington

If this is a glimpse into the future then I’m intrigued.

Last night in the Hall of Memories I floated through my city with new eyes, new ears and a new perspective. Everything was familiar but I was also seeing it for the first time. The projection and audio transported me into a parallel experience. I had no expectation going into it. I didn’t even know what I was showing up to. When I sat down in the back row I was prepared for anything.

Future Cities Wellington was an event produced by Pirate & Queen as part of their 2019 Lōemis festival. The Hall of Memories was transformed by a projection of Wellington through an interpretation of the future. It was a floating perspective of the streets of Wellington – pixelated and futurised. In the context of the venue it was very much a blended experience of what has been and what is to come. I felt as though I’d been dropped into a video game. It took me a while to find my bearings – to work out what my eyes were seeing. I found myself experiencing an every-day familiarity with hypnotic fascination.

I walked past War Memorial Tower every day for three years without knowing what was within it. I was walking past the Hall of Memories though I could never have told you it was there. When I stepped into the hall I was dumbfounded. How could I have not known it had been there all this time. How could something so beautiful have been hidden to me?

I now know the streets of Wellington better than I ever thought I would. When I moved to the capital it seemed like a boggling network of paths and alleyways. There was no way I would ever feel at home in them. But it’s been four years and these streets have become so comfortable that I walk them in the dark with my mind lost in a million thoughts and no consideration given to where my feet fall. I just walk and Wellington exists around me. It’s become familiar – ordinary.

I remember how I used to look at the city and I smile. My gaze was innocent and wondrous, but it’s one I rarely encounter here anymore.

The projection showed a vision of a central city apartment in which I lived for two years. As if it was winking at me, I was given a clear view of my old building’s facade. I have so many memories of that place but what I was seeing was something else entirely. New-found appreciation would be how I describe the sensation, not just for the streets I recognised but for Wellington as a whole. It was an appreciation for the places that I see everyday but forget to ever acknowledge.

When I walked to work this morning through the deserted streets of 5am, the sensations I felt the night before revisited me. I was floating down Courtney Place on a neon wave. Future Cities made me re-look at what I see everyday. It reminded me that was has become common was once novel. It gave me back that spark I first felt when I came to Wellington.

We see things through how we experience them and we experience things through how we see them. Future Cities made me take another look. It made Wellington new again. If this is a glimpse into the future then I’m intrigued.