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Physical Education, Sport & Exercise Sciences: Curiosities

Did You Know? Sport Inspires... Art

Henri Rousseau, The Football Players, 1908, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York. Image public domain

Do you know that ball games have been around all over the world for thousands of years? 

Mayan Relief of Pok-ta-Pok, 1000 BC

The origins of balls and ballgames can be traced back to over 3,000 years when the Olmec who were known as the rubber people in Mesoamerica left a rich cultural heritage to later groups, from the Maya to the Aztec. The oldest American ball was pulled from an El Manati, Mexico spring in 1992 and is more than 3,000 years old, it still had the smell of latex. See Swalgin, Ken. Ball Games of the World at https://sites.psu.edu/ballgamesoftheworld/ Accessed Jan 15, 2025

Room of the Gymnasts. Mosaic, 4th Century BC, Ancient Roman Villa del Casale, Piazza Armerina (Sicily, Italy)

Several women athletes are shown competing in sports that include weight-lifting, discus-throwing, running, and ball-games. A toga-wearing official on the bottom left holds the victor's trophies (a crown and a palm frond), and the victor herself appears crowned in the centre of the mosaic. 

Cyclist by Natalia Goncharova, 1913. Oil on Canvas. Public Domain

Cyclist is a 1913 Cubo-Futurist painting by the Russian artist Natalia Goncharova. The titular cyclist is a male figure bent over his bicycle while pedaling through a town or city. Goncharova was an early Russian developer of Cubo-Futurism, combining characteristics of both Futurism and Cubism in Cyclist. Cubist fragmentation, for example, is used to indicate the cyclist's speed.

Fifa Women's World Cup AU-NZ 2023 20 July 20 August Official Poster

Setting the tone for the rest of the artworks, the main poster for the Women's World Cup features a trio of female silhouettes with a multi-coloured soccer ball in the background.