Screenprint on paper
Tate Collection
Works with images
General Collection
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/anthea-hamilton-4789" aria-label="More by Anthea Hamilton" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Anthea Hamilton</a>
Divers
Presented by The London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games 2012
<p>This work is part of a portfolio of twelve prints by British artists that was commissioned by the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games to commemorate the 2012 Olympic Games in London. The contributing artists were Fiona Banner, Michael Craig-Martin, Martin Creed, Tracey Emin, Anthea Hamilton, Howard Hodgkin, Gary Hume, Sarah Morris, Chris Ofili, Bridget Riley, Bob and Roberta Smith and Rachel Whiteread. Creed, Hamilton, Hodgkin, Ofili, Riley and Whiteread were invited to create images for the Olympic Games while Banner, Craig-Martin, Emin, Hume, Morris and Smith created images for the Paralympic Games. The portfolio was produced in an edition of 150.</p>
paper print screenprint
Divers
image: 760 × 600 mm
Presented by The London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games 2012
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<p>This work is part of a portfolio of twelve prints by British artists that was commissioned by the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games to commemorate the 2012 Olympic Games in London. The contributing artists were Fiona Banner, Michael Craig-Martin, Martin Creed, Tracey Emin, Anthea Hamilton, Howard Hodgkin, Gary Hume, Sarah Morris, Chris Ofili, Bridget Riley, Bob and Roberta Smith and Rachel Whiteread. Creed, Hamilton, Hodgkin, Ofili, Riley and Whiteread were invited to create images for the Olympic Games while Banner, Craig-Martin, Emin, Hume, Morris and Smith created images for the Paralympic Games. The portfolio was produced in an edition of 150.</p>
<p>Anthea Hamilton uses sculptural assemblage and collage to create narrative environments. Characteristically, her approach to narrative uses representations of the human, especially female, body to engage with the history of physical prowess as a dominant subject in her work. The poised legs in <i>Divers</i> capture a gymnastic pose or gesture that calls to mind the balletic positions held by synchronised swimmers. The Olympic logo with its five interlocking rings appears to be balanced on the diver’s toes, while the background of the print has the watery appearance of a tiled swimming pool. Synchronised swimming is the only Olympic sport exclusively contested by women, and <i>Divers</i> evokes the engaging theatricality of this sport, one of the most artistically challenging of the Olympic Games.</p>
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<b>Further reading</b>
<br/>Julia Beaumont-Jones, <i>A Century of Prints in Britain</i>, London 2017, pp.33–4, reproduced p.225.</p>
<p>Leyla Fakhr<br/>November 2011</p>
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Summary
2018-08-21T00:00:00
summary
SHORT_TEXT