Basketball and Back-to-School: Madison Celebrates Brandon Donahue's The Art of Fitness

On Friday, July 26, Metro Arts staff gathered with members of the Tennessee State University men’s basketball team and around 80 summer camp students at Metro Parks’ Madison Community Center for a celebration of back-to-school, basketball and Brandon Donahue’s public art installation, The Art of Fitness.

As the community center wrapped up its summer camp program, Metro Arts passed out school supplies and the TSU Tigers men’s basketball team shared their skills on the new-and-improved court, ringed in mural art and covered in a durable orange and blue surface, paying homage to the former Madison High School and nearby Hunters Lane High School.

The striking court and backboards are the outdoor components of Donahue’s artwork; inside the center,The Art of Fitness also includes basketball “bloom" sculptures and vinyl silhouettes along the second-floor mezzanine depicting children at play.

The Art of Fitness grew from Brandon Donahue’s residency with the summer camp students at Madison Community Center in 2017. He encouraged the children to explore their ideas of themselves, their community, and their futures through drawing and collage. Along with students from TSU and Fisk serving double duty as his assistants and artistic role models for the campers, Donahue traced silhouettes of the children in active poses, which they filled with the art and ideas they had generated. The basketball components grew from the students’ favorite activity at the community center.

View photos from the July 26 celebration and of The Art of Fitness in the gallery below.

Photo credits: Atilio Murga and Tre Hardin.