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Why We Play Initiative Explores Sport, Art and Society Through Events
Last week, The Aspen Institute’s Sports & Society Program, part of the Aspen Institute’s U.S.-based research organization focused on leadership and social impact, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), the largest art museum in the western United States, announced Why We Play: Sport, Art and the Making of Modern Life. The 18-month initiative is bringing together athletes, artists, scholars and authors across a range of programs to examine how sport shapes social values, cultural identity and public life.
Culminating in a major LACMA exhibition and companion book aligned with the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games, Why We Play will also host events in Milan, Beverly Hills and Boston organized around three core themes: belonging, freedom and power.
Bolstering the initiative is a three-part roundtable conversation series on the themes developed by The Aspen Institute’s founder Tom Farrey and LACMA curator and companion book co-author, Brett Salvesen. The series previewed at the 2025 Project Play Summit in March, where Farrey and acclaimed author Michael Lewis explored how sport has shaped American communities for over a century.
“If you want to understand a community, watch how its members play – and watch others play,” said Farrey. “Sport in many ways is the glue that binds our diverse, messy, competitive societies, especially in the U.S. With the help of art and top minds, we will unlock insights that both explain how sport became a cultural force and how it can remain relevant going forward.”
The first roundtable, held in the iconic Rose Bowl Stadium locker room in Pasadena, California, kicked off November 12 with conversations centered on belonging. The event included sports sociologist Jay Coakley, Paralympian gold medalist Ezra Frech, Rose Bowl Institute President and former NFL player James Washington, documentarian Bryant Robinson, esteemed UCLA softball coach Sue Enquist, photographer Catherine Opie and music producer Brandon “Stix” Salaam-Bailey. The discussion explored sport’s power to cultivate community and connection — alongside the divisions, inequities and exclusionary experiences that challenge a more fully inclusive future.
“There are many throughlines between art and sport in the modern era – for example, a focus on the body and an engagement with technology and innovation,” said Salvesen, “Perhaps most importantly, art and sport are expressions of social values, aspirations and critiques.”
LACMA’s collection of more than 150,000 objects spanning 6,000 years of artistic expression will serve as a visual and conceptual anchor for the exhibition, helping ground the initiative’s core themes in mainstream culture. Insights from the roundtables paired with selected artworks will shape the exhibition’s development.
Future programming — including two additional roundtables on power and freedom — will be announced through the event website. The site also features a timeline tracing how sport has shaped society since the late 19th century along with educational resources and updates as the project evolves.
As LA prepares to host the world in 2028, Why We Play arrives at a pivotal moment. The initiative offers more than cultural programming; it provides a framework for understanding why sport matters, what it reveals about us and how it can be harnessed as a force for equity, representation and social progress.
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