Paris Olympics in 1924 inspires new Cambridge exhibition

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6 hours ago

By Katy Prickett, BBC News, Cambridgeshire

The exhibition will show how the 1924 Olympics was a breakthrough in changing attitudes to body image, identity, class, race and gender, say organisers

National Museum of Serbia An oil painting by Robert Delaunay showing runners in about 1924. There are five running modernist figures in brightly coloured clothes. — The exhibition will show how the 1924 Olympics was a breakthrough in changing attitudes to body image, identity, class, race and gender, say organisers

An exhibition inspired by the Paris Olympic Games in 1924 will reveal how international artists engaged with the themes of the sporting body a century ago.

The event was the first truly international games, according to curators.

A letter sent by American long jumper William DeHart Hubbard, the first black athlete to win an Olympic gold medal in an individual event, is among rare loans on display.

The exhibition at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge has been timed to open a week before the Paris 2024 Games begin.

The exhibition includes a letter from the first black athlete to win an Olympic gold in a single event – US long jumper William DeHart Hubbard

Collections Musée National du Sport, France A close-up of a black and white postcard showing William DeHart Hubbard in mid-air doing a long jump in 1924 — The exhibition includes a letter from the first black athlete to win an Olympic gold in a single event – US long jumper William DeHart Hubbard

The University of Michigan student wrote the letter to his mother aboard the SS America, as he was about to sail to Paris

DeHart Hubbard Collection/Cincinnati Museum Center A letter from William DeHart Hubbard to his mother in 1924, showing black ink on sepia-coloured paper — The University of Michigan student wrote the letter to his mother aboard the SS America, as he was about to sail to Paris

It also features works from leading modernist artists such as Pablo Picasso, Diego Rivera, Natalia Goncharova and Umberto Boccioni.

Their works are shown alongside classical sculpture, as well as posters, fashion and photography from the “Roaring Twenties” – a decade that saw dramatic economic and social change.

Artwork inspired by the sportsmen and women will feature alongside posters from the 1924 Games

DACS 2024/V&A Museum/Estate of George Grosz, Princeton A modernist painting of a running woman (left), a 1924 Olympic poster of several men raising their right arm (centre) and a modernist painting of a gymnast (right) — Artwork inspired by the sportsmen and women will feature alongside posters from the 1924 Games

Jacqueline Marval went from painting the classical nude to painting the bather in the 1920s, after she discovered French holiday resort Biarritz

Nicolas Rouxdit Buisson Jacqueline Marval's painting of a woman swimmer in a black costumer and white hat sitting on a beach, twisting to look over her right shoulder, 1920 to 23 — Jacqueline Marval went from painting the classical nude to painting the bather in the 1920s, after she discovered French holiday resort Biarritz

The 1924 Games was the first to broadcast radio commentaries and advances in training, clothing and equipment helped athletes break new records.

Olympians also became celebrities in their own right. Swimming superstar Johnny Weissmuller became a Hollywood star after winning gold, and American tennis player Helen Wills became the first woman athlete to become a global celebrity.

The exhibition will also feature a less well-known part of Olympic history – the art competitions incorporated in the Games between 1912 and 1948.

Paris 1924: Sport, Art and the Body runs until 3 November.