Graham Hudson
Athleisure Antiquity (Fountain)
2020
940 cm x 980 cm x 350 cm
Scaffold, exercise balls, hose pipe, water, steel pool and polypropylene figures; Discobolus, David, Nike and Venus
Commissioned by Wavelength, Shanghai
Courtesy, Monitor Rome, Lisbon, Pereto

THE BLANK CONTEMPORARY ART
99 WORDS WITH GRAHAM HUDSON

Do you desire to build a beautiful body? In 1882, circus performer, Friedriech Wilhem Müller toured Italy, inspired by sculptures like Michelangelo’s David’, he would re-mould his body in their image. He re-named himself Eugen Sandow, becoming the world’s first body builder and a symbol of Modernism. He’s in Duchamp’s ‘Large Glass’ and Joyce’s ‘Ulysses’. Schwarzenegger calls Sandow ‘My Hero’, he inspired NASA’s Aerobics and modern Yoga. But the Roman sculptures were copies of lost Greek works, which were more maths algorithm than physical study. Today we chase this tale of classicism, modernism and facsimile to dream the unattainable.