The Most Unexpected of Memories
I would have never thought I, a skeptic and cynic, could have deemed it “art.” I continuously challenge, fight and question the legitimacy of self-expression to be deemed as such. However, I found myself torn due to the sincere emotion it elicited. “It” was a pure and simple game of basketball being played in my neighborhood playground, in Parkchester. The event itself was not set on a grand stage, but the true meaning was below the surface. I saw one player dive to the floor and scrape his knee on the cold, hard concrete, leaving a slight gash. Amazingly, he simply got up and played as if nothing had happened. It was like the body in motion consumed with emotion. The muscles stretch and contort at the will of the controller, just so the team may preserve a single possession. Desire in it’s simplest and purest form; it was beautiful. I couldn’t help but remember a time not so long ago when I had just started to play the game. My skill level was poor at best but my effort had been unparalleled. I developed work ethic in this way until my other skills progressed. However, I never lost the urgency, and never will. I suppose I have expanded my definition of art, but I’m still not ready to accept “blank expression” into the category.
October 18th, 2007 at 9:49 am
what is the ‘art’ in this experience? I think I see what you are saying but you are missing maybe only 1 sentence that presents your idea fully.
October 18th, 2007 at 8:32 pm
I have never thought of the action of getting up from an injury and continuing to play as an art, but I have found some of the movements in shooting the baskets to be very smooth and beautiful. Similar to dance, some basketball players’ lines when they leap into the air to dunk into baskets are very elegant and appear to be effortless.
October 18th, 2007 at 11:09 pm
What I see here is the basketball game becoming kind of like a drama or a play. Here the injured player is trying to rise up and be a hero. I see the interesting story and plot twist behind the game as artistic.
October 19th, 2007 at 12:45 am
i usually see the technique and struggle in whatever sport it is as art. the technique because there’s so much purpose and coordination in some movements. one can also be moved by how much the athlete is pushing him/herself and can identify with the effort put in the match and practices. i really like the way steven put it: it’s like a story in which the athlete is the hero.
October 20th, 2007 at 1:30 am
Reading these comments just made me think of something I wrote a few years ago.
Fridays. The escape, the release and, oh, the joyous freedom. Some weeks it feels like it will never come, but when it does it’s as if my mind can finally get some rest. The beautiful sound of the tenth period ending bell rings in my ears, almost instantaneously carrying away my worries. I rush to my locker to get my coat and hat. I wait for Priyam and Badhan and we all proceed to the Tribeca Bridge. I say “Goodbye. Have a nice weekend” to all those I pass and happen to know. On Fridays, you see, I, along with multiple friends, engage in intense physical competition for the sake of pride, glory, or `bragging rights,’ as it were. Now, some would simply call it a friendly game of football or basketball, but that would not do it justice. I picture myself as a gladiator in the Coliseum, battling for survival against the lions, my adrenaline running. I can remember once we were playing a game of basketball (my favorite sport). It was game point for my team. I had begun the day shooting horribly, putting up brick after brick, but my teammate, John, having confidence in me kept giving me the ball until I caught fire, scoring about four points straight. Now the game was on the line. I whisper to John, “Don’t worry bout it, I got this one.” The ball was checked to John. He passed it to me and it was almost stolen. I recovered in the corner, shot the three and ‘It’s good! It’s good!’ We win the game. I felt as if I had achieved a new high, as if I was having an out -of -body experience. Basketball, a mere game, I think not.
It may not seem like much, I know, but in a life so constrained by society, by the wishes of parents, by my own impossible expectations, these brief journeys to a land in which I can be the hero are sometimes all I have. To be able to defeat the great beast, to score the winning basket gives me that coveted feeling of importance, of self worth. These moments are essential to my existence. They allow me to, even for a brief moment, escape from these chains which bind me.
October 21st, 2007 at 12:07 am
For me the reason it feels empty and “missing that one sentence that makes say its art” because I feel that sports only truly become an art when you experience it first hand. It can only be felt when you are actually on the court. For example, when I am truly into a game of basketball, it is as if nothing else mattters. I am not talking about the average pickup game. This is where my pride and my dignity is on the line. Every point I score is the greatest moment ever up to that moment, every point scored against me is like a dagger through the heart, and I will sacrifice my body just to keep a ball in play. I achieve a nirvana where everything is reactive, everything is instinctive, and it is all emotion. Embarassingly and proudly, I have burst out screaming like a madman when I play this way. It is primal. It is only then I see the sport of basketball as beatiful, it is only then I can appreciate basketball. That beauty is what I think makes a sport, like basketball, an art.
October 21st, 2007 at 7:38 pm
Reading your paragraph, Ravendra, and looking at all the comments beneath it really made me think about this question – the question of whether a sport could be considered an art and hence what the perimeters of “art” really is. What you initally wrote, I think, is beautyful in the way that it allows one to see the beauty and art in something that seems so simple. Your second entry, as a response to the many comments you have gotten, is truly what I see as the thought behind the first one. From what you wrote, I realized that anything can be art. An object, a tune, a movement and even a moment is art! Whatever one feels during a game, that moment of “self worth”, the moment in which one is freed from the chains that have put on by the outside world is a moment of art. It’s beautiful to experience such moments. I think it’s great how your entry and the way you expanded the meaning of art sparked so many valid thoughts and realizations in everyone.