Review

A review of the exhibition project, You’re Such a Good Sport

Robert Heishman, detail of "GOAL (aftermath)" for "You're Such a Good Sport," birch wood, Plexiglas, garbage from the March 3, 2010, KU vs. Kansas State basketball game. Photo: courtesy of the artist. All images link to artists' sites when available. Names of additional artists mentioned whose work is not shown also link to artists' sites when available.

Paragraph + Project Space
Kansas City, Missouri
March 19 —  May 6, 2010

Part sociological examination and part celebration of the innately competitive human spirit, You’re Such a Good Sport comes across as an unbiased critique of sports and sports culture that is simultaneously humorous, informative, and insightful. Effectively curated by Michael Schonhoff (local artist and arts professional), You’re Such a Good Sport opened to a warm reception at Urban Culture Project’s Paragraph Gallery on the third Friday of March.

The exhibition boasts an inclusive collection of photographs, video works, installations, collages, drawings, and performances. The opening night featured a performance by Kansas City’s very own avant garde cheerleading squad, Rah! Booty, for example, and a related set of public participation events — The Training Room — is scheduled during the exhibition. The exhibition also features local historical and culture artifacts on loan from the Kansas City Museum, the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, and private collections, such as the generous loan from local historian Hal Wert’s personal collection of Ray Noland’s silkscreened Obama Team Jersey Print.

Rah! Booty performing at the opening of "You're Such a Good Sport." Photo: courtesy Rah! Booty

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Andy Anima, "Mascot Purgatory" event, held during the opening night of "The Training Room" at the Urban Culture Project Space. Events continue through May 6. Click on the image for a complete schedule of events, including Lori Waxman's "60/wrd/min art critic" project, coming to Kansas City April 15 through 17. Photo: courtesy of the artist

One could argue You’re Such a Good Sport is dedicated to a wide audience: the frequent art gallery attendees, cultural historians, and sports enthusiasts. Therefore, according to the Urban Culture Project’s press release, the exhibition ”invites viewers and participants to discover commonalities within the meanings of gamesmanship and artmaking.” Presented in an equitable fashion, these commonalities are discovered through the rich onslaught of dialogue that the featured work creates. Dense but not overwhelming, You’re Such a Good Sport, in its multiplicity, presents a vigorous dose of options to choose from. The themes that appear to be fairly universal within the exhibition include the role of the audience, the spectacle, archetypes, place, and gender roles.

Installation view of "You're Such a Good Sport," showing "Hero" by Matthew Dehaemers in foreground and "Homestead Bleachers" by Aaron Shipps and Michael Schonhoff at left. Photo: Michael Schonhoff

The exhibition also serves as an educational outlet that provides both local and historical contexts as accounts of sports within Kansas City’s past. This is exemplified by pieces such as Showhorse, comprised of a video loop made from an original 16mm film that highlights the local history of equestrian competition, and J.E. Miller’s photograph of the Kansas City Monarchs at the 1924 Colored World Series, where the Monarchs, the National Negro League champion, won against the Eastern Colored League champion, Hilldale. Untitled (First Colored World Series) serves as a document of a truly historical moment, as well as a reminder of Kansas City’s powerful past. The archival photographs and videos, which, as mentioned, are on loan from local history museums, serve to promote the diverse history that can be found within the Kansas City region.

Robert Heishman, detail of "GOAL (aftermath)" for "You're Such a Good Sport," birch wood, Plexiglas, garbage from the March 3, 2010, KU vs. Kansas State basketball game. Photo: courtesy of the artist

These historical and cultural artifacts placed alongside contemporary pieces such as Robert Heishman’s GOAL (aftermath), Aaron Shipps's and Michael Schonhoff’s Homestead Bleachers, and Brett Reif’s Plaza Bounty, give the exhibition a sense of familiarity. It is within this reconigition of the familiar where the images and works on display shift from autonomous creations into an overarching dialogue that is interconnected. It is in this moment we are reminded of our commonalities, and this makes the exhibition extraordinarily special. What is common among these works is a familiarity of locality that appears to manifest itself in the material choices these artists have made.

Heishman and  Reif, as well as Shipps and Schonhoff, are using materials collected from the Kansas City region to comment upon sports culture. Heishman’s GOAL (aftermath) consists of a field goal made of birch wood and Plexiglas that is filled with trash collected from the March 3, 2010, KU vs. Kansas State game. It is an amusing as well as a revealing example of the leftover filth that sports gatherings create, and it serves as a comment upon how sports culture has contributed to these dire ecological times. Similarly, Homestead Bleachers appear to respond to these urgent ecological times by repurposing locally discarded bleacher frames and wood to create a new bleacher stand.

Installation view of "You're Such a Good Sport," showing "Bleacher Stand" by Aaron Shipps and Michael Schonoff. Photo: Michael Schonhoff

Brett Reif, who is known for his work in non-traditional media, creates one of the most visually engaging as well as challenging pieces in the exhibition. Plaza Bounty is comprised of tennis balls that he collected from the Plaza Tennis Center located in Midtown Kansas City and suspended in grape-like formations that are on par with his recent biological installations. The tennis ball clusters hang from garden hoses that protrude from the wall and dangle over under carpet forms. According to Reif the bunches serve as a comment on the Plaza’s association with leisure and commerce, and how the affluence of such bourgeois districts and activities serve to hide disparate realities of the communities that surround them. Reif refers to tennis, a form of domestic pleasure for the affluent, as a sport that is “very American and selfish.” Reif further draws attention to cultural and monetary divides within Kansas City by placing a light — which at first glance would serve to illuminate and stimulate the growth of the bounty — adjacent to the wall. Yet, for Reif, the light serves as a metaphor for the production of methamphetamines and marijuana, while the garden hoses that suspend the forms of growth, serve as a reference to the phrase “to cultivate a garden.” Plaza Bounty is a humorous reminder of how the spectacle can override the reality of what is happening in your very own city. It is a call to awareness, to question the relationship between sports culture and affluence; it serves as a reminder of issues still prevalent within Kansas City.

Brett Reif, detail of "Plaza Bounty," mixed media: tennis balls, hoses, foam, fluorescent growlight, dimensions variable, 2010. Photo: courtesy of the artist

Not all artists featured in the exhibition deal with issues specific to the Kansas City region, but instead with cultural archetypes through emphasizing historical places. Take Megan Mantia’s Badass in the Colosseum, where she simply assumes the role of tourist who is enthralled by what the Colosseum represents in terms of Western spectatorship. The Colosseum was the first massive arena that housed gladiatorial games, animal hunts, re-enactment of famous battles, etc. In short, it was the premier entertainment of the Western world during the time of the Roman Empire, and exemplifies our modern fascination with violence and affluence, which are still popularized in sports culture. Mantia just reminds us that these associations are historical and, most likely, intrinsic to human nature.

Other pieces are equally enjoyable, such as Chris Doyle’s Flight. Flight is a 45-second lo-fi video loop that illustrates one of the most popularized dreams of the sports fan, artist, and every man: to fly. Projected high upon the gallery walls, Flight is about the sheer exhilaration of the heightened moment of intensity found within all competitive games, as well as the creative process. It’s about succeeding past your expectations. The title also might seem to reference our culture’s preoccupation with sports figures and their “superhuman” abilities — and our desire to enact such feats.

Miki Baird, detail of "Caught… watching (at the line)," arch inkjet prints on museum board, 2010. Photo: Michael Schonhoff

Miki Baird’s Caught…watching (at the line) is just as enthralling in its simplicity. It’s composed of a collection of arch inkjet prints that Baird took of individuals within a crowd during the last two and half years of her following several professional bicycle races. Caught…watching (at the line) serves as a continuation of Baird’s interest in the subtleties of pedestrian activity. The photographs are mounted in the pattern of a checkered stripe on the gallery wall (a common form found within her work), in a vertical orientation from floor to ceiling. This orientation can imply the continuation of on-looker and racing enthusiasts in either direction, while referencing the unknown length of a given racing path. The stripe in this instance could be interpreted as a finish line or a meeting line in the gallery, where viewers discover the nuances of “watching,” and, perhaps, notice the commonalities of a collective experience. Baird’s Caught…watching (at the line) serves as a sociological study of the nature of our reactions to an event, such as bicycle racing, that highlights the power of human expression.

Whether it is familiarity of place or the commonalities shared within our desire to embrace the archetypes of history and sports culture, we find kinship in our attraction to the spectacle of sports. It’s in the spirit of competition we discover unity. Take the great American tradition of tailgating as an example of the ability of the competitive spirit to create community. This is what You’re Such a Good Sport is creating — a space to gain insight on the intersection of art, competition, gamesmanship, and life. In the process, the show begs multiple questions: What is the attraction to our obsession with competition? Have sports become a modernized Darwinian ritual? More importantly, how does the spirit of competition promote the notion of unity?

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