8'04", infinite loop with sound,
filmed by Marius Mihordescu,
edited by Ștefan Botez
thanks to Duna si Ștefan from the Calarași boxing club
In their study Quest for Excitement: Sport and Leisure in the Civilizing Process Norbert Elias and Eric Dunning connect the explosion and rapid spread of the sport phenomenon (sports as part of education in schools and in the military and also as entertainment) at the beginning of the 19th century with the process of industrialization. A way of expressing violence, physical violence, in a society which conquered by technological development lost this right.
As one of the most violent contact sports, boxing was not even considered as a leisure activity at the beginning of the 19th century, but a war training.
Inspired by Nicolai Howalt’s Boxer series, where the artist makes portraits of teenage boxers before and after the training, Teach me how to fight documents exactly that, what happens between the moments the shots were taken. Violence is shown in Howalt’s pictures just by details of expressions, faces showing fatigue, fear, sometimes drops of blood and sweat, sweat is always present.The series is extremely personal because Howalt did box himself as a teenager, but the images of young boys covered in sweat, blood and fear, can push us into thinking about homoeroticism? Yes, but also as in Golding’s Lord of the Flies, about violence as a given fact, as a general human feature, as a general male feature and as a need. And if there is a need, this need should/has to be expressed, and educated.
As in skateboarding, boxers learn from watching other boxers how they move and fight but unlike skaters they learn from watching themselves. The mirror is an important object in a boxer’s training. As in dancing, posture, the image of the self, makes the movements accurate, precise and effective.
Teach me how to fight intrudes on a small boxing club of Calarasi Romania trying to understand Nicolai Howalt’s images, and how boxing contributes to the male image in general. But visually it distance itself from the cold aseptic view of Howalt’s series, diving into a more intimate kind of aesthetics which reminds of Collier Schorr’s wrestlers. She describes her expirience of documenting the wrestling universe as a dance, ducking and crouching to protect herself from the hits and to get as close as it was necessary to take the shots.
Speaking about dance, and taking into consideration the mirror which acts as a doorway between this two apparently so different worlds. Teach me how to fight makes also reference to Ali Kazma’s Dance Company. Not to think that boxers look like dancers, although sometimes they do, but the lack of dialogue and the abrupt cuts transforms the material into something which is ready to step out the realm of documenting and step in to the field of fiction.
Inspired by Nicolai Howalt’s Boxer series, where the artist makes portraits of teenage boxers before and after the training, Teach me how to fight documents exactly that, what happens between the moments the shots were taken. Violence is shown in Howalt’s pictures just by details of expressions, faces showing fatigue, fear, sometimes drops of blood and sweat, sweat is always present.The series is extremely personal because Howalt did box himself as a teenager, but the images of young boys covered in sweat, blood and fear, can push us into thinking about homoeroticism? Yes, but also as in Golding’s Lord of the Flies, about violence as a given fact, as a general human feature, as a general male feature and as a need. And if there is a need, this need should/has to be expressed, and educated.
As in skateboarding, boxers learn from watching other boxers how they move and fight but unlike skaters they learn from watching themselves. The mirror is an important object in a boxer’s training. As in dancing, posture, the image of the self, makes the movements accurate, precise and effective.
Teach me how to fight intrudes on a small boxing club of Calarasi Romania trying to understand Nicolai Howalt’s images, and how boxing contributes to the male image in general. But visually it distance itself from the cold aseptic view of Howalt’s series, diving into a more intimate kind of aesthetics which reminds of Collier Schorr’s wrestlers. She describes her expirience of documenting the wrestling universe as a dance, ducking and crouching to protect herself from the hits and to get as close as it was necessary to take the shots.
Speaking about dance, and taking into consideration the mirror which acts as a doorway between this two apparently so different worlds. Teach me how to fight makes also reference to Ali Kazma’s Dance Company. Not to think that boxers look like dancers, although sometimes they do, but the lack of dialogue and the abrupt cuts transforms the material into something which is ready to step out the realm of documenting and step in to the field of fiction.
