Bodybuilding and the future of gender
Arnold Schwarzenegger is an icon. During the filming of Pumping Iron, filmed in 1975 and premiered in 1977, he is only 28 years old, but is already at the end of his competitive career as a bodybuilder and carries five consecutive Mr. Olympia awards, the biggest professional bodybuilding competition in the world. All the bodybuilders featured in the documentary know his name, idolize his career and are fascinated by his body. A superhuman body, swollen beyond natural limits. A body that can reveal to us a future in which gender is not relevant or even doesn't exist.
John Berger said that “men act” and “women appear”, underlining the trope that men advance the story and women are mere decorations, the passive subject of just existing for the benefit of others. The body of a bodybuilder, whether male or female, is subject to gender confusion, it is simultaneously masculine and feminine: it expands beyond the normal to underline the weight of virility, the muscles pushing the skin and veins in a demonstration of strength, of invincibility, the superman capable of advancing the story of any epic, just to offer himself to the appreciation, the appearance, the exhibition; it is a body that at the height of its appearance of strength is weaker, more fragile, dehydrated, malnourished, the skin thinner than a sheet of paper. It is a hyper masculine body that gives itself to a hyper feminine practice. As Susan Bordo said, “it is feminine to be on display”.
A bodybuilder looks at his body the way a sculptor looks at the statue he sculpts: from the outside. It allows him to work his own body as an external object, outside his consciousness. For him, there is no difference between appreciating his body or another bodybuilder's body; and this appreciation is devoid of sexuality, it is focused on technique, on results, as an art critic appreciates a sculpture. The body is worked beyond its natural limits, the distance between the mind and the body allows him to transcend pain and embrace the rigor and discipline that bodybuilding requires. The body is his but it is not part of himself, it is a functional object to be worked, polished, built and improved with an aesthetic rather than a functional purpose. Schwarzenegger's body does not act, it appears. And everyone else wants to appear like him.
If this confusion of gender and distance between body and mind can teach us anything, let it be the ease with which it is assimilated by the mainstream. If it is not difficult to understand bodybuilding or the bodies that are worked for competitions but that exist beyond them, it will also not be difficult to imagine a future in which any body distances itself from the mind, from the sheltered identity, bodies and minds simultaneously masculine and feminine, so simultaneously that there is no difference. Can bodybuilding give us this? Can Schwarzenegger's body be the metaphor for a society free from the obligations of the body and the limitations of gender?
Additional reading:
Berger, J. (1972). Ways of Seeing. Penguin Books. London.
Bordo, S. (1999). The male body: A new look at men in public and in private. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. New York.
Butler, J. (1990). Gender Trouble. Routledge. London.
Fussell, S. (1991). Muscle: Confessions of an unlikely bodybuilder. Abacus Books. London.
Richardson, N. (2004). The queer activity of extreme male bodybuilding: gender dissidence, auto-eroticism and hysteria. Social Semiotics. 14:1: 49-65.
Bodybuilding and the future of gender
Arnold Schwarzenegger is an icon. During the filming of Pumping Iron, filmed in 1975 and premiered in 1977, he is only 28 years old, but is already at the end of his competitive career as a bodybuilder and carries five consecutive Mr. Olympia awards, the biggest professional bodybuilding competition in the world. All the bodybuilders featured in the documentary know his name, idolize his career and are fascinated by his body. A superhuman body, swollen beyond natural limits. A body that can reveal to us a future in which gender is not relevant or even doesn't exist.
John Berger said that “men act” and “women appear”, underlining the trope that men advance the story and women are mere decorations, the passive subject of just existing for the benefit of others. The body of a bodybuilder, whether male or female, is subject to gender confusion, it is simultaneously masculine and feminine: it expands beyond the normal to underline the weight of virility, the muscles pushing the skin and veins in a demonstration of strength, of invincibility, the superman capable of advancing the story of any epic, just to offer himself to the appreciation, the appearance, the exhibition; it is a body that at the height of its appearance of strength is weaker, more fragile, dehydrated, malnourished, the skin thinner than a sheet of paper. It is a hyper masculine body that gives itself to a hyper feminine practice. As Susan Bordo said, “it is feminine to be on display”.
A bodybuilder looks at his body the way a sculptor looks at the statue he sculpts: from the outside. It allows him to work his own body as an external object, outside his consciousness. For him, there is no difference between appreciating his body or another bodybuilder's body; and this appreciation is devoid of sexuality, it is focused on technique, on results, as an art critic appreciates a sculpture. The body is worked beyond its natural limits, the distance between the mind and the body allows him to transcend pain and embrace the rigor and discipline that bodybuilding requires. The body is his but it is not part of himself, it is a functional object to be worked, polished, built and improved with an aesthetic rather than a functional purpose. Schwarzenegger's body does not act, it appears. And everyone else wants to appear like him.
If this confusion of gender and distance between body and mind can teach us anything, let it be the ease with which it is assimilated by the mainstream. If it is not difficult to understand bodybuilding or the bodies that are worked for competitions but that exist beyond them, it will also not be difficult to imagine a future in which any body distances itself from the mind, from the sheltered identity, bodies and minds simultaneously masculine and feminine, so simultaneously that there is no difference. Can bodybuilding give us this? Can Schwarzenegger's body be the metaphor for a society free from the obligations of the body and the limitations of gender?
Additional reading:
Berger, J. (1972). Ways of Seeing. Penguin Books. London.
Bordo, S. (1999). The male body: A new look at men in public and in private. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. New York.
Butler, J. (1990). Gender Trouble. Routledge. London.
Fussell, S. (1991). Muscle: Confessions of an unlikely bodybuilder. Abacus Books. London.
Richardson, N. (2004). The queer activity of extreme male bodybuilding: gender dissidence, auto-eroticism and hysteria. Social Semiotics. 14:1: 49-65.
Texts
— Bodybuilding and the future of gender
room sheet of the Cineclube EA's showing of the film Pumping Iron, 2021
— 'The Kiss': The obscene off the scene
published on the Journal of Technology and Science of the Arts, 2021
Texts
— Bodybuilding and the future of gender
room sheet of the Cineclube EA's showing of the film Pumping Iron, 2021
— 'The Kiss': The obscene off the scene
published on the Journal of Technology and Science of the Arts, 2021
Miguel De (Portugal, 1992) is a multidisciplinary artist, who works with photography, writing, performance, music and video. He has a master's degree in Photography from Escola das Artes da Universidade Católica Portuguesa (2022) and a degree in Cinema and Audiovisual from Escola Superior Artística do Porto (2013). He lives in Braga.
He published a photography artist book in 2021, “conhecer um corpo”. He has already exhibited his photographic and videographic work in Lisbon, Porto and Braga. In 2022 he was featured on the list of Best Portfolios, in an international portfolio reading promoted by the IMAGO Lisboa Photo Festival. He regularly collaborates with the Braga Media Arts and Braga’27 projects, promoted by the Municipality of Braga.
In addition to visual work, he is part of Circo Caótico with Daniel Seabra and Mafalda Gonçalves, where he is the author of the music and sound design for the collective's performances. He collaborates with BANQUETE – Association for Research and Creation in Performing Arts, also with the creation of music and soundscapes for performance. From 2015 to 2017 he produced electronic music as Tundra Fault. He also DJs as Miguel De Jay.
He collaborates with artists from various fields, such as João Pedro Rodrigues, Maria Trabulo, Antonio da Silva, Daniel Seabra, Joana Castro, Júlio Cerdeira, Dora Vieira, David Machado, Distorted Vision, Rui P. Andrade (Canadian Rifles) and Lola Rossi.
Exhibitions and press
Solo exhibitions
→ Procuro-te por toda a parte, mas só encontro paisagem. — Lugar.Landescape — Ovar, Portugal, 2025
→ Masc — Livraria aberta — Porto, Portugal, 2022
Group exhibitions
→ Masc — Too Much of a Good Thing, a ilha / XYZ Books — Lisbon, Portugal, 2023
→ Pega de fogo — ACTUM, Palácio do Raio — Braga, Portugal, 2023
→ Masc — Amor em Tempos de Cólera - ACTUM — Braga, Portugal, 2021
→ Masc — Panorama21 - Escola das Artes da Universidade Católica Portuguesa — Porto, Portugal, 2021
→ The myth of Atlas — ACTUM — Braga, Portugal, 2020
Texts and interviews
→ Tap Juice — Tap Juice — Braga, 2025
→ Arde — Umbigo Magazine, 2022
→ Falar Fazendo: Media Arts — Braga'27 — Braga, Portugal, 2022
→ Vamos Falar? Onde vês arte? — Rádio Universitária do Minho — Braga, Portugal, 2021
→ The Kiss: The obscene off the scene — Journal of Science and Technology of the Arts (Vol. 13 Nr. 2) — Porto, Portugal, 2021
→ Bodybuilding and the future of gender — Cineclube EA — Porto, Portugal, 2021
→ Braga de... — Braga'27 — Braga, Portugal, 2021
All work
2025 | Comission | Workshop | Shopyard: Film Photography Course | see more → |
Creation | Performance | Actos e Omissões | see more → | |
Creation | Photography | Procuro-te por toda a parte, mas só encontro paisagem. | see more → | |
2024 | Comission | Live visuals | Darksessions w/ Fuga | see more → |
Creation | Live radio | Alarido ao vivo | see more → | |
Comission | Music | Pó de Pedra, by Circo Caótico | see more → | |
Comission | Music | Hide to Seek, by Júlio Cerdeira | see more → | |
Creation | Podcast / Newsletter | Alarido | see more → | |
2023 | Creation | Video | Pega de Fogo | see more → |
2022 | Comission | Video | Ovar Escondido | see more → |
Comission | Music | Matérias Inúteis, by Banquete | see more → | |
Comission | Video + workshop | Imaginary Cartographies | see more → | |
2021 | Creation | Music | PNRM | see more → |
Comission | Music | Raíz, by Circo Caótico | see more → | |
Creation | Photography | Masc | see more → | |
Comission | Video | Darktraces, by Joana Castro | see more → | |
Creation | Photography book | Conhecer um corpo | see more → | |
2020 | Creation | Photography | O mito de Atlas | see more → |
Creation | Music | Sinfonia do Futuro | see more → | |
Creation | Film | The Kiss | see more → | |
Comission | Music | Por um fio, by Daniel Seabra | see more → | |
Comission | Music | Com(Sequência), by Circo Caótico | see more → | |
Comission | Music | Crisálida, by Daniel Seabra | see more → | |
2019 | Comission | Music | [HOSE], by Daniel Seabra | see more → |
Comission | Video + Music | Circuito | see more → | |
2018 | Comission | Music | Ocupa #3 w/ Dora Vieira and David Machado | see more → |
2017 | Creation | Music | Tundra Fault | see more → |
Miguel De (Portugal, 1992) is a multidisciplinary artist, who works with photography, writing, performance, music and video. He has a master's degree in Photography from Escola das Artes da Universidade Católica Portuguesa (2022) and a degree in Cinema and Audiovisual from Escola Superior Artística do Porto (2013). He lives in Braga.
He published a photography artist book in 2021, “conhecer um corpo”. He has already exhibited his photographic and videographic work in Lisbon, Porto and Braga. In 2022 he was featured on the list of Best Portfolios, in an international portfolio reading promoted by the IMAGO Lisboa Photo Festival. He regularly collaborates with the Braga Media Arts and Braga’27 projects, promoted by the Municipality of Braga.
In addition to visual work, he is part of Circo Caótico with Daniel Seabra and Mafalda Gonçalves, where he is the author of the music and sound design for the collective's performances. He collaborates with BANQUETE – Association for Research and Creation in Performing Arts, also with the creation of music and soundscapes for performance. From 2015 to 2017 he produced electronic music as Tundra Fault. He also DJs as Miguel De Jay.
He collaborates with artists from various fields, such as João Pedro Rodrigues, Maria Trabulo, Antonio da Silva, Daniel Seabra, Joana Castro, Júlio Cerdeira, Dora Vieira, David Machado, Distorted Vision, Rui P. Andrade (Canadian Rifles) and Lola Rossi.
Exhibitions and press
Solo exhibitions
→ Procuro-te por toda a parte, mas só encontro paisagem. — Lugar.Landescape — Ovar, Portugal, 2025
→ Masc — Livraria aberta — Porto, Portugal, 2022
Group exhibitions
→ Masc — Too Much of a Good Thing, a ilha / XYZ Books — Lisbon, Portugal, 2023
→ Pega de fogo — ACTUM, Palácio do Raio — Braga, Portugal, 2023
→ Masc — Amor em Tempos de Cólera - ACTUM — Braga, Portugal, 2021
→ Masc — Panorama21 - Escola das Artes da Universidade Católica Portuguesa — Porto, Portugal, 2021
→ The myth of Atlas — ACTUM — Braga, Portugal, 2020
Texts and interviews
→ Tap Juice — Tap Juice — Braga, 2025
→ Arde — Umbigo Magazine, 2022
→ Falar Fazendo: Media Arts — Braga'27 — Braga, Portugal, 2022
→ Vamos Falar? Onde vês arte? — Rádio Universitária do Minho — Braga, Portugal, 2021
→ The Kiss: The obscene off the scene — Journal of Science and Technology of the Arts (Vol. 13 Nr. 2) — Porto, Portugal, 2021
→ Bodybuilding and the future of gender — Cineclube EA — Porto, Portugal, 2021
→ Braga de... — Braga'27 — Braga, Portugal, 2021
All work
2025 | Shopyard: Film Photography Course | → |
Actos e Omissões | → | |
Procuro-te por toda a parte, mas só encontro paisagem. | → | |
2024 | Darksessions w/ Fuga | → |
Alarido ao vivo | → | |
Pó de Pedra, by Circo Caótico | → | |
Hide to Seek, by Júlio Cerdeira | → | |
Alarido | → | |
2023 | Pega de Fogo | → |
2022 | Ovar Escondido | → |
Matérias Inúteis, by Banquete | → | |
Imaginary Cartographies | → | |
2021 | PNRM | → |
Raíz, by Circo Caótico | → | |
Masc | → | |
Darktraces, by Joana Castro | → | |
Conhecer um corpo | → | |
2020 | O mito de Atlas | → |
Sinfonia do Futuro | → | |
The Kiss | → | |
Por um fio, by Daniel Seabra | → | |
Com(Sequência), by Circo Caótico | → | |
Crisálida, by Daniel Seabra | → | |
2019 | [HOSE], by Daniel Seabra | → |
Circuito | → | |
2018 | Ocupa #3 w/ Dora Vieira and David Machado | → |
2017 | Tundra Fault | → |