(some observations from the webmaster)

In late 2005,
Vova Galchenko,
a young Russian who has recently come under the international spotlight
for his technical prowess, renewed the fire over the perplexing question
"Is Juggling an Art or a Sport?"
by producing an Internet video that ended with the expression
"Art my A**."

Not long thereafter, Anthony Gatto, along with power jugglers Thomas Dietz and Toby Walker put out a numbers juggling video with some vaguely artistic elements combined in their routine that ended with all three of them responding
"Sport my A**."

The average juggling spectator may wonder
"What is this all about?"

It's actually quite simple.

In part, these comments have been made in jest.
However, they belie the inability of some jugglers to grasp the basic concept that some activities (ummm ... juggling for example) are beyond the simple labels that are haphazardly applied to them - namely, several sports jugglers seem to be unable to understand that juggling is much broader than the sports juggling label that they have created.
Gymnastics and figure skating have suffered the same dillema for decades - should judges adjudicate scores based on technical difficulty alone or should they base their adjudication on technical difficulty and artistry and style? Figure skating has borne the heat of this connundrum fairly well as many of the artistic moves remain quite physically challenging as well. However, gymnastics has lost much of its artistic flare in favor of more physically demanding routines - rare is the medalling routine that graciously exhibits both elements in force. However, in a competitive setting, you have to make a decision as to how to compare various competitors so the issue has of course surfaced in IJA festivals for many years now (and to be fair, they seem to be doing a pretty good job in most competitions). With the introduction of the WJF and the contrasting rules and style that came along with the WJF competitions, the issue has become more pronounced and some jugglers are trying to force this issue onto the world juggling scene via various agenda driven appearances.

An example? Jason Garfield is notorious for his comedy routines decrying mediocre jugglers who focus their attention on entertaining audiences in a market driven society by performing relatively easy (and "stolen") routines that are vastly approved by audiences uneducated as to the intricacies of juggling. Many accomplished jugglers are annoyed by these entertainers or, in the alternative, by the audience response to these entertainers, because the idea that juggling while eating an apple is difficult or that juggling torches is extremely dangerous is simply a novice and naive concept - and the accomplished jugglers simply want recognition for their superior technical prowess over these mediocre entertainers.

HOLD ON!!!
Let me restate that last sentence for our litigation hungry generation:

JUGGLING TROCHES really IS EXTREMELY DANGEROUS

for non-professional jugglers who don't know enough about juggling clubs in the first place ... but for professional jugglers who know how to juggle clubs and who are not stupid enough to throw the torch at their own head or to grab the torch with their fingertips, it is not especially dangerous. Vova apparently agrees with Jason's position that non-market driven jugglers deserve more attention and respect for their accomplishments and so do others - this has spawned the fairly new label "sports juggling" and a following of jugglers who have the noted following characteristics:

Sports jugglers are accomplished jugglers - not even mediocre jugglers, these jugglers rightly bill themselves as very advanced jugglers and they pull off astounding tricks that give them some bragging rights. However, they tend to put very little thought or effort into the aesthetics of their environment - usually their stage dress is a T-shirt of some drab color and sweats of equally boring prominence. Their props tend to be drab as well - usually not very colorful (often they are simply white) and not especially fancy - the attention is supposed to be on the patterns and the technical difficulty of the juggling, not the props or the juggler's costume. Many portions of their routines are gratuitous - backcrosses, pirouettes, and long runs of basic numbers patterns dominate their routines.

This is perhaps the single and notable problem with sports juggling - it becomes as drab as the costumes themselves after you watch enough of it. Okay Jason and Vova, 5 club backcrosses and pirouettes (oops - sorry, I meant 180s, 360s, 720s, etc.) are indeed very difficult and they are undoubtedly the mark of a polished professional - and we don't fail to be impressed by any juggler that can pull off 5 club backcrosses - but we've seen it many times now and these tricks are becoming stale - is this the end all of juggling? Is there no creativity in numbers juggling beyond siteswaps, backcrosses, and "pirouettes"?

Oh - and by the way, for a field of jugglers who groan about stolen street acts, it is somewhat ironic to note that they don't seem to remember that they did not invent the five club cascade, backcrosses, pirouettes (nor did they invent the terms 180, 360, etc.), or siteswaps. Come to think of it, every sports juggling routine I've seen has been comprised mostly of tricks that were "stolen" from other jugglers. Hmmm. Well, I've only watched about 4,000 juggling videos and many of those were not sports jugglers so maybe that is a rash judgment on my part - please pardon any indiscrepancy with any contrasting reality that has escaped my attention as I have only watched several hundred routines of numbers jugglers who may or may not bill themselves as sports jugglers! The point is, sports juggling is the extreme end of the juggling paradigm and it comprises only one element of a much more richly laden activity.

In contrast, artistic jugglers are not so interested in obtaining proportional recognition for their personal achievements - they are more interested in performing tricks that please the audience and/or in performing tricks that are unusual and out of the ordinary - do the names Stephen Ragaatz, Peter Davidson, Michael Menes, or Michael Motion ring a bell? Three cheers for accomplished jugglers who still like to put artistic flare into their performances!
Oops - there is my bias again ...

These jugglers often perform tricks that are indeed difficult but this is not their focus. Imagine Michael Motion going onto a stage in sweats and a T-shirt - does this seem unlikely to anyone besides myself? Michael is extremely artistic and spends a vast amount of time thinking about every element of his routine - not just the tricks themselves - so that the audience will leave with an artistic experience - not just a "wow, he was a great juggler" experience. That said, no one would accuse Michael Motion of being a mediocre juggler either - however, no one who is familiar with sports juggling would bill him as a sports juggler.

These jugglers give a significant amount of time and thought into preparing their props, stage props, costumes, routine transitions, and stage persona. While they often do perform difficult tricks, the audience's attention would rarely be consumed by the presence of these tricks because there are many other elements to the performance to consider.

Worthy of note is the fact that artistic jugglers have not labeled themselves.

Anthony Gatto has mentioned in some interviews that he is not happy with what is happening in the American juggling scene because we Americans have become more interested in worrying about who is the best juggler instead of just enjoying the routines for the unique artistry that they are (if you are unfamiliar with this trend, watch the 2004-2005 WJF competition interviews). However, I have not seen Anthony billing himself as an "Artistic Juggler" either - he lets his work speak for itself. And frankly, because he is a numbers guru, many artistic jugglers would not really consider Anthony an artistic juggler even if he did bill himself as the

because the artistic elements of his routines are largely outweighed by their heavy emphasis on his technical prowess - and this in spite of the fact that he may see himself as an artistic juggler.

That said, there is no movement in the juggling world to label the remaining portions of the jugglers out there who are not sports jugglers. No one appears to be suggesting that we have "Market Driven Juggler" labels for the average street performer or "Je ne sais quoi" labels for the artistcly inclined juggling entertainers. What we do have is artistic jugglers who remain largely without an international venue to compete and demonstrate their respective talents in a competition where they have a realistic chance of taking home the gold so long as the numbers champions receive the highest recognition. We also have a few performers who compete by adding some very difficult tricks to their otherwise artisticly dominated routines (check out the IJA 2004 bronze medal routine for a great example). We also have Europeans who largely and unofficially "boycott" performing at the IJA festivals (with a few notable examples - thank you Francoise and Jay for your regular appearances) and who remain content to attend the EJC where they can see artistic juggling to their heart's content.

As I alluded to above, juggling is far too broad of a label to be confined to the narrow labels of sports juggling or artistic juggling - rather, sports juggling ought to be considered a branch of juggling just like ball spinning, prop balancing, contact juggling, fire-staff spinning, or joggling can be considered branches of juggling.

What is happening is that some jugglers have lost respect for the rightful position of other branches of juggling to peacefully coexist without the exchange of derogatory comments. While Jason Garfield is often given the "greatest offender" award for failing to appreciate other juggling branches, he very well stated this concept for a recent juggling video plug where he showed his support for the video by stating something to this effect

"It's good juggling - just not the type that I like to watch!"

Personally, I enjoy most forms of juggling - whether they are somewhat imprisoned by sports juggling or artistic juggling labels - and I am eagerly anticipating the marriage of these two schools of thought - just as they eventually merged in figure skating to some extent. Every several years or so, we get a glimpse of this at IJA festivals when the gold medalist has also provided a very artistic flare and significant creativity in his/her routine - check out Greg Kennedy's 1996 IJA routine (juggling balls in a bowl) and Francoise Rochaise's very feminine 1995 IJA routines for example. Anyone who saw Thomas Dietz's inspiring 2004 IJA routine after watching Emile and the other refreshingly artistic jugglers perform that year has to wonder - what would Dietz's routine have been like if he would have taken the time to install an artistic theme throughout his performance - and what would it have been like if he would have had a nice costume and a few stage props to enhance the performance?

Wow - now that is something to look forward to.

Until then ...