Art for basketball

There has always been a connection between arts and sports, as proven by a recent installation in Brasov

Ana-Maria Cononovici, 21.09.2021, 11:52

There has always been a connection between arts and sports, and many artists have been interested in sports as a source of inspiration. Recently, the city of Brasov in central Romania has hosted the installation – exhibition titled “Fan”, which brings into the limelight female personalities in todays basketball.

Flavia Dobrescu, an Experience Designer and author of the exhibition, told us more:

“Our exhibition, titled Fan, like in sports fan, is an interactive installation about womens basketball in Romania. In other words, we wanted to show people what we can do as fans to support women involved in this field in Romania. Therefore, we did some research, which resulted in this project. Weve talked to women who play basketball or are involved in this world, and we have asked them to recall a moment when they felt encouraged by the people around them. We gathered their answers and presented them in this installation. The interactive part consists in the way in which this exhibition involves the viewer. We ask them to throw the ball into the basket. Weve built a smart basket which, when somebody scores, gives and answer and displays an image, with information about Romanian women basketball players.”

Flavia Dobrescu also told us how the idea of the project came to life:

” Part of the background of this project is the fact that I myself try to play basketball, as an amateur, and its quite difficult. Its hard to be accepted in this world of men so I said I should do something about it. After that, the development of the project was like a game played by an entire team, because it has so many components. It has the creative part, the research, the robotics part, where my colleagues from Creation Motion helped a lot. As regards the research, I also got lots of support from female basketball players in Romania, who accepted to participate. So, again, it was all about collaboration, about bringing people together and about the support we can give each other, after all”.

So, on the last summer weekend, the installation – exhibition lobbied for several women in Romanian basketball. Here is Flavia Dobrescu again :

” So far weve included 10 women from Romanian basketball, some of them from the national and Olympic teams, as well as trainers and managers. We tried to cover a wide range, to show that there are many faces to this world. We have both junior and senior players, personalities that we want to present to the public.”

We asked our interlocutor to tell us one of the stories she learnt from the women she interviewed as part of the project.

” I will tell you a story I heard from Alina Podar, from Olimpia Brasov. She told us how, one time, when her team had been defeated and the players were pretty down, a boy came down to the basketball court and handed her a pair of tiny basketball boots and a marker and asked her to sign them, because, to him, she was the best player ever.”.

The first visitors to the exhibition were those in Brasov, but the project authors would like to turn it into a travelling exhibition, and thus reach as many places across the country as possible

” For now, we presented it as part of the AMURAL festival in Brasov, in late August. The festival has ended, but we would like to carry this project on, to present it in other places as well. We want to take it away from the world of sports and to reach people that maybe have never had contact with this world. We are now looking for solutions. I must say that women have never been encouraged to play this sport, not even as amateur players. And this starts in school, because in class, the boys play basketball or football, and the girls are watching. Ive seen that myself, many times. On several occasions, when weve got to such classes, weve encouraged them, weve played with them, but these ideas should be assimilated at institutional level”.

Visual arts festivals change our perception of various activities carried out in cities, and so creative industries are stimulated to find new forms of expression that we can benefit from beyond the moments that generated them. (MI)