Drawing on insights from Brian Eno, Stephen Wolfram, and Melanie Mitchell—music, computer science, complexity studies—author and science journalist Siobhan Roberts considers the enduring influence of John Conway‘s game of life, in the aftermath of the mathematician’s recent passing. Sporting vertiginous fractal GIFs, and artwork by Kjetil Golid (image: Golid’s Crosshatch Automata), Roberts provides an introduction to cellular automata and artificial life, and gives (surprisingly generous) air time to the computational and generative art practices it inspired.