After a summer full of sporting events, in­cluding the Olympic Games and the Eu­ro­pean Foot­ball Cham­pi­onship, the Kunstfort looks at the pol­i­tics around sport, its per­cep­tion, me­di­a­tized image, and col­lec­tive memory. In the ex­hi­bi­tion Pol­i­tics at Play, Play at Pol­i­tics, var­ious prej­u­dices are ad­dressed which play a role in the per­cep­tion and ap­pre­ci­a­tion of ath­letes and sports. Among these are gen­derism, sexism, na­tion­alism, and racism, as well as the struggle for colo­nial in­de­pen­dence and Cold War pol­i­tics: from Ruud Gullit to Zine­dine Zi­dane, from ex­plicit com­ments on Veronica In­side to im­plic­itly bi­ased com­men­tary re­garding ath­letes’ abil­i­ties, and from un­equal pay de­pending on gender and color, to working con­di­tions in Qatar and the in­volve­ment of refugees in sports. It might be the players who com­pete in the match, but out­side the arena many more pol­i­tics are at play.
Cu­rated by Zip­pora El­ders (Kunstfort) and guest co-cu­rator Vin­cent van Velsen.

Artists: Marcel van den Berg, Dina Danish, Bardhi Haliti, Hiwa K, Amina Menia, Claudia Rankine & John Lucas, Martine Rose, Yara Said.

Cover: Marcel van den Berg, Been There & Back, 2011. Acrylic on canvas. Courtesy of The Black Archives.