Breaking (when it means dance, not news): Links

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Years ago when I worked at Ballet Hispanico I saw a dancer rehearsing wearing a t-shirt that read "I'm not a tomboy, I'm an athlete". The phrase stuck with me. I remember thinking that a variation of the shirt could easily be "I’m an athlete because I’m a dancer."

Since Breaking was announced as the latest addition to the Olympics that phrase has been on my mind. I've been pleased to see so much conversation on my feeds with Breaking being about joyful, curious, exciting subjects instead of the latest in news mayhem.

• B-Girl Ami Yuasa wins first-ever breaking Olympic gold medal. (YouTube)

• B-Boy Phil Wizard claims inaugural men's breaking gold at Paris Olympics. (YouTube)

• How Breaking Went From a Street Dance to an Olympic Sport. This summer, 32 athletes will compete in what's commonly known as breakdancing, a dance sport that combines athleticism and artistry. (Smithsonian Magazine)

• Dance Leads the Way as Art Meets Sport at the Cultural Olympiad. A program of arts events shown in conjunction with the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games looks at the relationship between art and sport. (New York Times)

• Fantastic feature explaining Breaking: More than 50 years since its inception, BREAKING will debut as an Olympic sport in Paris, where B-boys and B-girls will vie for gold and glory. (New York Times)

• How Will Breaking Be Scored at the Olympics? A panel of nine judges will apply Olympic rules to the dance form that originated as a free-flowing expression of hip-hop culture. (New York Times)

• What if All Dance Forms Were Considered Equal? At the Palais Garnier, ballet met hip-hop and beyond in a glittering Cultural Olympiad presentation of Saïdo Lehlouh's ever-evolving "Apaches." (New York Times)

• Once Sidelined, Breaking's B-Girls Now Throw Down at Center Stage. Women are competing in breaking in greater numbers and, thanks to better training and more opportunities, with more dynamic moves. (New York Times)

• The Surprise of the Olympics: Breakers' Delight. Breaking was invented by Black and brown kids, mostly male, in the Bronx in the 1970s. That it made Olympic history by opening with B-girls was everything. The logic of introducing breaking as a new competitive event aside, these female competitors, with their B-girl spirit and ethos, pulled the Olympic Games into the global here and now. (New York Times)

• A Viewer's Guide to Breaking at the Olympics. (Dance Magazine)

• Judging Breaking at the Olympics Is an Art, Not a Science. Breaking debuts as an Olympic sport at the Paris Games. To get there, the breaking community had to figure a way to objectively judge the subjective, while letting the dance remain a dance. (Wired)

• Don't Think Breakdancing Is a 'Real' Olympic Sport? The World Champ Agrees (Kinda) Phil Wizard, the current favorite for Olympic Gold, says it's an art and culture first. But if you're gonna hate, he'd like you to at least learn the proper terminology. (Wired)

• Poetry Was an Official Olympic Event for Nearly 40 Years. What Happened? Pierre de Coubertin hoped the modern Games would encourage the ancient Greek notion of harmony between "muscle and mind." (Smithsonian Magazine)

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Antonio Ortiz

Antonio Ortiz has always been an autodidact with an eclectic array of interests. Fascinated with technology, advertising and culture he has forged a career that combines them all. In 1991 Antonio developed one of the very first websites to market the arts. It was text based, only available to computer scientists, and increased attendance to the Rutgers Arts Center where he had truly begun his professional career. Since then Antonio has been an early adopter and innovator merging technology and marketing with his passion for art, culture and entertainment. For a more in-depth look at those passions, visit SmarterCreativity.com.