08. Charles Mudede

A writer, filmmaker, and cultural critic, Charles is Seattle’s consummate philosopher. Currently working on an installation for Manifesta 8 (European Biennial of Contemporary Art) and a film about Sara Jane Moore—the woman who attempted to kill President Gerald Ford in 1975—he’s also working on a local project called Pop Life, organized around Hidmo, an Eritrean restaurant/community center in Seattle’s Central District. Seattle: Hidmo Eritrean Cuisine, 106 Pine Wine Bar, Fort St. George restaurant.

www.chasejarvis.com/seattle100/charlesmudede

It is a History of the Future

On Culture

Seattle is a techno city. Its downtown has about it the smoothness of a microchip. All of its defining buildings—the Central Library, the Columbia Tower, the Union Square towers, its stadiums—are new and capture the spirit of 21st century technology and utopianism. On our best days, the air is as clear as the glass. If there is any history here, it is a history of the future. The city’s landmark, the Space Needle, does not point to the past but to tomorrowland. If an impression of the past is what you are after, go to Portland; if you want to feel the future, this is the city to be in.