Spart

Spart or Spart Action is a political/cultural group/movement born somewhere in 2001. Its roots lie in the avant-garde tradition, although what distinguishes it from other similar practices is an understanding of the avant-garde as a genre, rather than heritage. The significance of Spart lies in its understanding of politics, which sets it apart from all other forms of late 20th/early 21st century art activism. Spart does not create spectacular public actions that demonstrate to people the problems of society, because Spart believes most people within society already understand its problems. Instead, Spart works directly configuring social relationships in everyday life dealing with politics as an embodied state of being.

History

Spart is known to have been conceptualised in 2001 by Justin McKeown, although the 1st public ‘spartworks’ were not presented until 2002. Early ‘spartworks’ included public actions such as ‘Drinking Blindfolded in Oxford (I shit you not) ’, ‘Drinking Blindfolded in Zagreb (I shit you not) ’ and ‘Pogo Manifesto’. In November 2004, the 1st International Spart Insurgence was held in Sofia, Bulgaria. Participants included: Justin McKeown (Northern Ireland), Vassya Vassileva (Bulgaria) and Friedrich Nichtmargen (Akademgorod, Siberia). The event opened with the inaugural 'Summit on the Summit' when on the morning of 4th November Spartists congregated on Cherni Vrah Peak, the mountain over looking Sofia, to create and participate in Spartist events. The event then continued for another week with various public and private events. Other spart events have taken place throughout Europe since including the 2006 Invisible SPART Insurgence (Belfast & Serbia) and Arts Birthday party at the Centre for Suburban Research in Belfast.

Terminology

The word Spart was coined by Justin McKeown in 2001. It was originally used to refer to a hybrid of sport and art in which the pathology of sport would be combined with the creativity of art in a bid to create a pastime which was as monsterously violent as the contemporary urban city. As Spartist ideology progressed so to has the understanding of the relationship between sport and art. This relationship is summed up in the original theory of Spart, as described in the 1st ‘Spart Manifesto’, is the Spart life dichotomy:
SPART = the politicisation of leisure time
LIFE = My most profound leisure activity
Spart is normally written as SPART.

External links

* [http://www.spartaction.com/ Home of Spart on the web]
* [http://alytusart.w3.lt/tinklapis/1_biennial/participants/justin_en.htm Spart at the Alytus biennial of experimental Art]
* [http://www.zarez.hr/131/vizualna4.htm/ Review of Spart action in National Croatian Art Magazine 'Zarez']
* [http://psychonautic.wordpress.com/ SPART interactive online project]
* [http://www.youtube.com/user/spartaction/ SPART on youtube]