John Wilson

speaker

3,312 appearances 24 recordings 9 series first heard May 2026 last heard 6d ago

John Wilson’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 24 in all, peaking in Aug 2026 with 8.

Appearances

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This Cultural Life · Liam Young · 11 Jun 2026 podcast

You say an extreme version because your question is how do we do that?

My question would be why would you want to do that?

I mean, it's totally impractical, isn't it?

So what's the point of the idea?

But was there anybody there in the audience who possibly wasn't a billionaire who said, look, all of these ideas are predicated on technological solutions.

But what you're not factoring in is society, human interaction, the need to live not all together in one place for us to have separate identities and cultures and existences.

I mean, how much of those ideas were factored into Planet City?

On This Cultural Life, Liam Young, my guests choose the influences and experiences that most inspired their own creative lives.

And your first choice is the Usborne Book of the Future, which was published in 1979, the year that you were born, I think, and which you say you were fascinated by as a four-year-old boy.

Before we talk about that book, tell me a bit about your upbringing, childhood.

Born in Australia, whereabouts?

Because so much of the work does explore our relationship with nature and our responsibilities towards nature.

So that's rooted in those childhood memories.

Yeah, exactly.

And you said your mother, single mother, was a puppeteer.

In her spare time, that was her entertainment for you?

So the Usborne Book of the Future, this is a picture book with text that predicts or speculates, I suppose you could argue, how life might change on Earth and in space over the course of the 21st century.

What aspect of the future, as depicted in the book, most appealed to you?

So this book is feeding your imagination with visions of the future.

Did you start to create your own visions in terms of art, drawings, models?

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