Stages #8: Beautiful world, where are you?

This volume brings together ideas and projects that emerged from the public programme of the 10th anniversary edition of Liverpool Biennial (July-October 2018), responding to a line from the poem The Gods of Greece by German poet Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805): ‘Beautiful world, where are you?‘ The line evokes the lost grandeur, beauty and meaning embodied by mythical Greece, translated to our contemporary not-so beautiful reality.

At irregular intervals between May and October 2018, an eclectic list of speakers from fields as diverse as economics, biology, linguistics, media theory, architecture and painting were invited to directly address or indirectly refract Schiller’s question, as part of the new programme of talks curated for Liverpool Biennial 2018 by The Serving Library.[2] Designed to run in parallel with exhibitions and projects elsewhere in the city, the programme was presented at Exhibition Research Lab[3] alongside The Serving Library’s collection and an installation of Paul Elliman’s new work commissioned for Liverpool Biennial 2018 entitled Vauxhall Astra 2020.[4] Developed and expanded from this initial context, the contributions to this volume include Morehshin Allahyari in conversation with Christiane Paul, as well as from Ryan Avent, Jessica Coon, Meehan Crist, Candice Hopkins, Mark Miodownik, Jussi Parikka, Alexander Provan, Forensic Architecture (presented in the talks programme by Eyal Weizman) and Paul Elliman, whose graphic identity for Liverpool Biennial 2018 is represented in the cover image. The volume is conceived by Joasia Krysa.