Sports But Make It Art

There’s no social media user whose work my friends send me more regularly than the genius known as ArtButMakeItSports. It combines two things I like: sports and art. It’s so nice to be known.

So, I had some questions for LJ Rader, who runs the account. He had answers, and this is what you’ve got. His own Substack is here.

LA: Why do you think your work resonates so strongly with people who are big sports fans, but may not have much of an interest in fine art?

LJR: I think folks, even if they aren't predisposed to art, just enjoy visual parallels. I also think that people that aren't predisposed to art or art fans might have not been exposed to art in the right way. Maybe they've been brought up to think that either you're a jock or you're an art kid, and there's no in-between. The art world is quite intimidating and stuffy, and I think it turns a lot of people off. So I think this is a very easy entry point for people because it gives them an avenue to see it in a way they've never had before.

That's a really interesting way to look at it. My theory is that, like you were saying about jocks versus art kids, I don't think people view sports that way anymore. I think part of the appeal of what you do is that it legitimizes the artistic, creative, aesthetic nature of sports.

What's your background? How have you developed such an extensive knowledge of fine art?

I grew up going to museums. My grandma was a fan of taking us, and then she, and my grandfather — my grandfather's family was quite poor, but they owned a garage in the Village — and oftentimes they had artists who were tenants of the parking garage. The artists wouldn't be able to pay, so they would give them art. So my family had a pretty impressive art collection from this sort of random parking garage that had been in my family. So I had that instilled in me from a young age, but I wasn't great at creating art myself.

I took a class in college, like in art history, 101, and really enjoyed it. I would never claim to, like, be really solid on art theory, or things that somebody that got a formal education in art history would know about.

I'm much more on the visual connections side. I can potentially look at a piece of artwork and understand the artists that influenced that artist without having, like, formally studied art. The foundation really is just going to tons of museums. At every museum I go to, I photograph as much as I can that I think could potentially be inspiration for the account. I've amassed this massive folder of art that I can use as a reference. But I do live in New York, so there's obviously a lot of museums here, too.