Team Sport is an art exhibition of photographs, weaving, and sculptural work about the weekly soccer pickup league, Dyke Soccer. Created over the past five years, it is part archive, part love letter. It documents both the hanging-out and the queer physicality of the space, soccer as a fandom and obsession, and artist Maddie Keyes-Levine’s personal history of the sport.
Central to the project are sport trading cards. Displayed in a leather binder, they feature Dyke Soccer players portraits on one side and stats on the back. Each portrait was taken collaboratively, asking players how they wanted to pose. They act both as a collective statement and as an object, expressing my fandom and infatuation with the people I play with.
Obsessed with the phenomenon of being hit so hard it leaves a mark — the erotics and physicality of that — Keyes-Levine created a spanking paddle out of a soccer ball and had their ex hit them as hard as possible. From this mark, Keyes-Levine photographed and printed the wall-sized hanging that backgrounds the show. Enormous and somewhat grotesque, it speaks to the intensity of their feelings as well as their own attraction to the contained experiences of pain and risk that are agreed to on the field; to the tension between sport, physical risk, and care; to a community asking each other to play “like you don’t have health insurance” and then taking care of each other when one of them inevitably takes a hit.
Team Sport will be on view at One Gallery in West Hollywood from Thursday, October 24-Sunday, November 3, 2024. Gallery hours are Thusdays-Sundays, 1-7 p.m.
The opening reception for the exhibition will take place at One Gallery in West Hollywood on Friday, October 25, 2024, from 7-8:30 p.m. This will include a brief artist talk and a ceremonial spanking with the Dyke Soccer paddle.
As part of the exhibition, there will also be a soccer scrimmage that will take place at the Great Lawn in West Hollywood Park on Monday, October 28, 2024, from 7-9 p.m.
This exhibition may not be suitable for all ages.
Maddie Keyes-Levine is an artist from Southern California. Their work is about webs, play, and obsession. They graduated from CalArts with a BFA in Photography and Media in 2023. They’ve been playing soccer since they were five years old.
This exhibition and program are organized by Maddie Keyes-Levine as part of Circa: Queer Histories Festival 2024, presented by One Institute.
One Gallery is an art gallery and cultural programming space operated by One Institute, the oldest active LGBTQ+ organization in the country. Located in the heart of West Hollywood, One Gallery is dedicated to hosting archival and contemporary art installations that showcase LGBTQ+ history. Through partnerships with established and emerging community partners, the gallery also serves as a low-cost, multi-purpose space for community meetings, creative workshops, classes, and other mission-aligned programming.