Start Date
4-30-2026 12:35 PM
End Date
4-30-2026 1:45 PM
Disciplines
History
Subjects
Olympic Art Competitions, Pierre de Coubertin, Amateurism
Abstract
In 1912, Baron Pierre de Coubertin’s modern day Olympics celebrated not only its five year anniversary, but the first inclusion of the Olympic Art Competitions. Resembling a neo-Renaissance, Coubertin envisioned a “balance of the muscle and the mind” through the unity of the physical and intellectual. But by 1948, the art competitions had collapsed, leaving the social experiment to be forgotten by future generations. Drawing upon personal testimony from Coubertin and his loyal successors, and records from the International Olympic Committee, this paper explores how Coubertin’s extreme dedication to a pure and sanctified Neoclassical ideal led to the art competition’s demise. Secondary scholarship informs not only Coubertin’s but his staff’s unfailing dismissal of the avant-garde and persistent dedication to the amateurism ideal. Pierre de Coubertin’s attempt to foster a neo-Renaissance, further inhibited by his successors’ loyalty to amateurism, ensured that the Olympic Art Competitions were unsustainable and doomed to fail.
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Included in
Golden Age or Gilded Cage? The Rise and Dissolution of the Olympic Art Competitions, 1912–1948
In 1912, Baron Pierre de Coubertin’s modern day Olympics celebrated not only its five year anniversary, but the first inclusion of the Olympic Art Competitions. Resembling a neo-Renaissance, Coubertin envisioned a “balance of the muscle and the mind” through the unity of the physical and intellectual. But by 1948, the art competitions had collapsed, leaving the social experiment to be forgotten by future generations. Drawing upon personal testimony from Coubertin and his loyal successors, and records from the International Olympic Committee, this paper explores how Coubertin’s extreme dedication to a pure and sanctified Neoclassical ideal led to the art competition’s demise. Secondary scholarship informs not only Coubertin’s but his staff’s unfailing dismissal of the avant-garde and persistent dedication to the amateurism ideal. Pierre de Coubertin’s attempt to foster a neo-Renaissance, further inhibited by his successors’ loyalty to amateurism, ensured that the Olympic Art Competitions were unsustainable and doomed to fail.