Full Description
Taking the most existential question, ‘What is the Meaning of Life?’, this publication dissects creative expression, considers the place for frivolity, and unpacks the rhythms and rules of the everyday to address how we might live more meaningfully.
In this highly illustrated book, John Kenneth Paranada looks at how creativity can offer a greater sense of purpose, and the role of art in resetting the tempo of a distracted culture. Ben Highmore and Sam Tacconi explore how embracing play and a gaming approach to life can bring value and make sense of behaviours, both on an individual level and across communities, while Ed Krčma and Jessica Barker address the evolving daily routines and societal rules by which we live our lives, examining how these impact our sense of purpose and belonging. Finally, Rosy Gray reflects on how grief can offer pause and how we can find solace in the multiverse, urging us to re-consider the meaning and value of our (many) lives.
This book accompanies a season of exhibitions and projects at the Sainsbury Centre.
About the Author
Jessica Barker is Senior Lecturer in Medieval Art at The Courtauld in London. She has published widely, in journals including Art Bulletin, Art History, British Art Studies, The Burlington Magazine, Gesta and The Sculpture Journal. Jago Cooper is Executive Director of the Sainsbury Centre, and Professor of Art and Archaeology at the University of East Anglia. Recent publications include Living Art Sharing Stories (2023) and Mapping a New Museum (2022). Rosy Gray is Head of Living Art at the Sainsbury Centre. Joining the Sainsbury Centre in 2024, Rosy has previously developed collections, exhibitions and artist commissions across a range of public institutions in the UK. Ben Highmore is Emeritus Professor of Cultural Studies at the University of Sussex and a Fellow of the British Academy. He is the author of 11 books, most recently Lifestyle Revolution: How taste changed class in late-twentieth-century Britain (2023) and Playgrounds, the experimental years (2024). Ed Krčma is Associate Professor of Art History at the University of East Anglia. His first monograph, on Robert Rauschenberg’s illustrations after Dante, was published by Yale University Press in 2017, and his articles have appeared in various scholarly journals, including Art History, American Art, Oxford Art Journal, The Burlington Magazine and Umění. Tania Moore is Head of Exhibitions at the Sainsbury Centre. Her publications include Rhythm and Geometry: Constructivist Art in Britain Since 1951 (2021) and Henry Moore: Friendships and Legacies (2020). John Kenneth Paranada serves as the Curator of Art and Climate Change at the Sainsbury Centre, and a researcher at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, University of East Anglia. Publications include: A Path Forward: Curating Art and Climate Change at the Sainsbury Centre, in Museum International (2024) and How Do We Begin a Meaningful Conversation About Art’s Place in the Climate Crisis, in Design for our Planet (2023). Samuele Tacconi is an archaeologist and holds a PhD from the University of East Anglia. His recent publications include Benedict XIV’s Donation of Amazonian Objects to the Istituto delle Scienze of Bologna, in the Journal of the History of Collections (2021) and Games and Social Organisation in the Pre-Columbian Andes (PhD thesis, 2025).
