Inside Selfridge’s Superfutures Exhibition in London

When Harry Golden Selfridge first conceived of Selfridges in 1908, the retail tycoon wanted to make shopping more fun rather than a chore. Experiences and theatrics were at the top of his mind, and he enhanced the shopping experience by attracting customers to both educational and scientific exhibitions. Over 100 years later, this legacy remains. This time with a massive, thought-provoking art exhibition, Superfutures.

Teaming up with Berlin’s Reference Festival, Selfridges’s Superfutures features 13 spectacles co-curated by Agnes Gryczkowska and Reference Studio’s founder Mumi Haiati. Dressed mannequins sit pensively within black, inflated walls by Ottolonger and Jan Vorisek. A large face perched on a mechanical stand by Gentle Monsters watches over the shoppers like Fitzgerald’s Doctor Eckelburg in “The Great Gatsby.” There’s even an installation by Katja Novitskova that brings visitors to a sort of aquatic world filled with technological coral.

“The Superfutures exhibition will present past and future universes, full of mutation and cohabitation, blurring boundaries between the organic and crafted, between human and machine, and challenging existing outlooks and normative gestures into reshaping our future,” says Mumi Haiati in a press release.

But, there’s more to the exhibition than a theatrical shopping experience (though they’ve certainly accomplished that). The exhibition explores the future. Similar to how much of the fashion industry is exploring technological innovation, the Reference Festival at Selfridges comments on the state of the future: how we may live, how it might feel, and what it might look like. And like all truths, there’s a tinge of a dark side felt throughout the exhibition. Perhaps, this is purposeful. Perhaps, it is subjective. Either way, the exhibition is certainly worth a visit. Whether you’re looking to ponder on these thoughts, or even if you need a break from shopping. \