Saatchi Art’s Visions of the Future collection is preparing for its public debut on Wednesday, August 24th, and will feature works by 50 photographic artists who venture into foresight, predictions, and speculations of the world to come. 

Stemming from an open call that received submissions from over 800 artists worldwide, the selected artists produce images spanning a range of topics from climate change to fashion, digital construction to documentary, using both humor and somberism to express their ideas of what the future will look like, feel like, and how we will exist within it. 

In this time of rapid change in technological, political, and cultural spheres, the world we occupy seems, each day, to balance on the precipice of some foreboding outcome. The rapidly growing complexity and interconnectivity of our world’s social and technical mechanisms leads to much unpredictability and, in turn, collective anxieties of a tomorrow that is growing ever more uncertain than the last.

It is within these contexts that working artists delve into and reflect upon, and in which they seek to make sense of the irrationalism of day-to-day existence. In this manner the hopeful become idealists, the pessimists brood on dystopian outcomes, and this see-sawing tension comes to the forefront as we examine how the artists of this open call grapple with the world of today and tomorrow.

The medium of photography itself has long been accepted as one best suited for telling stories about the past, rather than the future. A medium grounded more in memory than imagination. 

However what we find in the previews of Visions of the Future are new approaches to photographic practice that strive to present a future tense of photographic discourse. It is a reminder that the roadmap to the future is written by artists, casting a power of imagination to serve as a blueprint for the rest of society to follow. 

For the release of the collection, Saatchi Art is going beyond the typical paradigm in a few key areas. The platform has designed a unique ‘Phygital” experience that allows Visions of the Future collectors to redeem their holdings for a limited edition gallery print of the pieces they own. If the NFT is sold on the secondary market, 2 subsequent holders may each redeem a print through the end of 2022.

The NFT auctions will last for 7 days after the first bid is initiated, with varying reserve prices based on the artists’ respective sales history. And all the work from the collection will be exhibited at Saatchi Art’s globally recognized “The Other Art Fair” in Los Angeles.

For collectors who hold pieces from Saatchi Art’s genesis project, The Other Avatars, early access bidding will begin next week.

PhotoVerso produced this special issue in collaboration with Saatchi Art. For more information about Visions of the Future, including the artist list, the jury pool, and more auction details, visit them at: www.saatchiart.com/visions-of-the-future.

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