Conference organiser: Karen Jacobs

Museums have never been just reflections of the people and societies materialised within them but also institutional drivers of cultural action, political perspective and social change. In 2023 the Sainsbury Centre relaunched with a new concept, Living Art Sharing Stories, which rethinks what the museum can be today. The Centre understands its collections as living entities that can help us address fundamental societal challenges. The exhibition programme therefore explored Big Questions related to climate change, truth, war and other global issues.

The 2024 meeting of MEG in the Sainsbury Centre at UEA (Thurs-Fri, 25-26 April) marked 50 years of MEG meetings, and aimed to highlight the important role museums can play in addressing challenges in collegial and collaborative ways. Museums holding ‘ethnographic’ or ‘World Cultures’ collections find themselves at the forefront of new debates and controversies, but also new opportunities.

See the conference programme.