New Sports Merge Performance Art With Athletics

The NY Times takes a look at the curious marriage of performance art and athletics, introducing us to newly invented sports with names like Circle Rules Football and VikingBall where simply playing seems to be the whole point. Unless as the article suggests, you create a website or post videos of your activities online, in which case you’re suddenly granted membership into a cultural movement. An assumption that seems to forget that making up games is something little kids in backyards and dirt lots have been doing since time immemorial without so much as a mention in any larger societal context. If fun and imagination are only now emerging trends, then what have we been doing all this time?

That’s not to discount the games themselves, as they’re certainly noteworthy both for their ability to lower the bar to participation and their zany creativity which serve as welcome antidotes to the big business and social issues associated with professional sports today. Besides, most sports we enjoy today had relatively humble origins themselves, so who’s to say we won’t be going to watch Whiffle Hurling at a corporate sponsored stadium someday?

[via NY Times]