Rugby Creed, 2016
Video installation, dimensons variable, 5:16 min.

This work employs the cliché aesthetic of traditional athlete portraits to raise the perception of disabled athletes to that we commonly attribute to other sports stars. Both inhabit a space of the ‘other’, a person who is 7’10” would seem off a basketball court, but we see able-bodied individuals as super-human where as we view disabled individuals as broken or lesser in comparison. By equating the two in this work I am question our ingrained perception of disability and disabled athletes, the notion of being both dis and super abled breaks the viewers passive assumptions and forces a reassessment of these individuals, and their position in society. The wheelchair is seen as the primary symbol of disability, it is viewed by the general public as an object of confinement and something to be overcome. Through these digital portraits, and the accompanying creed, the wheelchair is reframed as extension of the individual. One that provides mobility, strength, and independence, both on court and in day-to-day life. This repositioning of the symbolic wheelchair from hindrance to empowerment and the reposition of these disabled individuals from passive victims to active sports heroes forces the viewer to revisit their understanding of disability, disabled sports, and disabled individuals. The aesthetic of these digital portraits focuses the viewer’s attention on the individual subjects, it allows time and space for the viewer to investigate in detail the individuals, their chairs, and the intimate relationship between the two. Where traditionally people engage with the disable image through the ‘Stare’ pacifying the subject, distancing themselves, and diagnosing the subject as ‘other’, these portraits invite the viewer to inspect the subjects with reverence while the individuals maintain their agency.