Marilyn Rayray

ABS-CBN News

<p>René Concepción, a former Olympic swimmer for the Philippines, is making waves once again—this time at the Paris 2024 Olympic Museum as a featured artist in the &quot;Olympians Artists&quot; program. This initiative highlights athletes who excel in both sports and the arts.</p><p>Concepción, also known as “Coach Guy”, represented the Philippines at the 1988 Seoul Olympics and has since cultivated a remarkable career as an artist, merging his athletic discipline with his creative vision.</p><p>He is one of seven Olympian artists exhibiting at the Paris Olympic Museum, and notably, the first Filipino and the only Asian selected.</p><p>Other featured artists include Luc Abalo (FRA) - painting, Annabel Eyres (GBR) - paper cut and collage, Grace Latz (USA) - multimedia and fiber art, Enzo Lefort (FRA) - photography, Brooklyn McDougall (CAN) - painting, and Clementine Stoney Maconachie (AUS) - sculpture.</p><p>A year before the Paris Olympic Games, Akiko Thomson, OLY, suggested Coach Guy submit his work for the Olympian Artist Exhibition. This exhibition offers Olympians who create art the chance to be part of the Paris Olympic Games.</p><p>Excited by the opportunity, Coach Guy decided to go for it. </p><p>A few months later, his proposal, based on past and Olympic themes, was accepted.</p><p>The Olympic Museum discovered a dynamic community of Olympians passionate about art. To support them, they created opportunities to produce and share new works.</p><p>In 2018, the program began with a small group at the Winter Games and has since expanded, featuring comprehensive exhibitions at the Tokyo Games.</p><p>Anja Wodsak, Arts &amp; Culture Programming Senior Manager at the Olympic Museum, explains the selection process for Olympian artists in the program, saying, “So we issued a call for proposals about a year and a half ago to a larger group of Olympians who were in our database, Olympians who also make art  and we received propositions for community based projects or individual project. We gave the candidates a choice and then we reviewed those proposals and we selected the candidates who you see here in the exhibition at seven, and then a few additional ones who did projects in different community sent us around Paris five of them, and they were selected for the originality of their artistic approach for the diversity of their means of creative expression, and we tried to put together a really diverse group of Olympians who make art and to feature interesting stories.”</p><p>Thrilled to have five of Coach Guy’s works in the exhibition, Wodsak was captivated by the aesthetic quality of his work. She found it really interesting and quite abstract, but with a lot of meaning embedded in the pieces.</p><p>“In terms of colour and form, they were really appealing… And I especially liked also the narrative behind these works. And René&#x27;s story is really inspiring. There’s a lot of his personal history and his family’s history embedded into these pieces, and they speak so much to his own resilience and perseverance and dedication as a former athlete, but also as a person, he’s really driven and also has a really positive outlook on life, so when a challenge comes his way, he seems to have a knack for turning it into an opportunity, and I think that’s what happened with his art-making. So yeah I think he’s a wonderful creator, a wonderful artist and I really look forward to seeing where he will go with this,” she said.</p><div><br/></div><div><strong>From swimming lanes to artistic canvases</strong></div><p>Over the years, Coach Guy has cultivated a remarkable career as an artist, merging his athletic discipline with his creative vision. His artistic journey began ten years ago with his older son, Pablo, who showed a natural talent for drawing even at a young age.</p><p>When Pablo was still a baby, he drew on their bathroom tiles, and his parents were impressed by the quality of his work. Coach Guy and his wife decided to get Pablo an art teacher, and he joined in the lessons. With no real intention of becoming an artist himself, he simply enjoyed spending time with his son and painting alongside him.</p><p>Coach Guy is a happy husband to Tricia, and they have two wonderful sons Pablo and Rory. Both their children are the key to Coach Guy&#x27;s current artistic endeavors with Pablo showing great talent as an illustrator that he pursued the visual arts to be aligned with Pablo. Meanwhile, Rory (who is a child with Down Syndrome) has influenced his artistic intentions completely.</p><p>He recalls the turning point when he became truly devoted to creating artworks: “My younger son Rory has Down Syndrome and he’s really a big, big, big part of why I became an artist. It started with my older son Pablo when we started to enjoy drawing together and painting together, but it’s really Rory, kind of turned me into this, because when he was only a year and a half, he had leukaemia. And so my wife and I decided to go to the States for chemotherapy and then we stayed because we felt like the United States will be better for Rory one, for treatment and two, for his overall development. But while he was going through chemo, I brought Pablo to an art store in the States and we just started to draw. And it was so helpful for me to get through those six months and actually nine months of going through chemotherapy so I stuck with it and it turns out in 2024 it was recognised which is really unbelievable for me.”</p><p>Art has always been an integral part of Coach Guy&#x27;s life, initially through film. He has a Master in Fine Arts degree from Columbia University with a film directing concentration.</p><p>With a background in filmmaking, he cites François Truffaut, a key figure of the French New Wave in the 1950s, as his artistic hero. This filmmaker profoundly influenced his artistic vision and the type of art he aspires to create.</p><p>At the Paris 2024 Olympic Museum, Coach Guy’s artworks engage visitors with their vivid imagery and profound Olympic themes. They are mixed-media painting collages where he used materials like cardstock with acrylic, ink, tempera, clippings, stickers, ribbons, and sticky tape.</p><p>Every artwork speaks of post-modernist collage of chaotic visuals organized in a manner to evoke allegorical images and emotions. These notable pieces are Beyond the Box, Host City, Producer, Courage, and Slides and Ladders.</p><p>Using vibrant colors, sweeping brush strokes, and cut-outs of personal photos, the artworks are personal for Coach Guy. While they depict the fluid motion of swimming, with abstract forms that elicit the swimmer’s inner concentration, they symbolize both physical movement and the pursuit of one&#x27;s goals.</p><p>The pieces also portray strength and perseverance through powerful imagery and bold contrasts, underscoring his ability to convey deep emotional and cultural narratives through art.</p><p>His very first piece for the selection is titled Courage (2024), which he identifies as his anti-AI piece.</p><p>“I just wanted to show that any AI will never be an Olympian, and also that an AI will never be able to create art that has flaws, that has emotions, that has doubt, that has pain because they’ll clean it up and I think a computer will clean it up. If you really look closely at this piece there are many mistakes. In fact, the one guide here in this gallery is frustrated. She saw a piece of hair inside and I said, yeah that’s my hair. I kept it there because my DNA is in this piece and it’s a mistake because we make mistakes, we’re human beings…” Coach Guy said.</p><p>Charly Charles, Hopscotch Europe account director and an art enthusiast is also drawn to Coach Guy’s works: “It’s obvious that it’s colourful, I sense a lot of energy, a mix of messy and structured at the same time, it’s very modern, I really like it you know… A painting, a collage or a mix of both, I really it!”</p><div><strong>Pool and palettes: parallels in personal reflections</strong></div><p>Reflecting on his dual roles as an athlete and artist, Coach Guy emphasizes the importance of both endeavors: “Even if swimming may seem like an individual sport, I totally believe swimming is a team sport. I saw myself as part of a team and my contribution was always to uplift our team, most importantly the national team.  I was representing my country (the Philippines), and so my efforts were always to make my country proud. I started doing art at a more micro but far more important level - for my family.”</p><p>He added, “Ano ba talaga ang swimmer or athlete? Masipag? Never gives up and also talented. You have to have a certain skill and  it takes all those combinations including support, coaching, family support, even financial… All of those things have to come together. And so what’s the same with my art and as a swimmer, well, my struggle, my doubt, sometimes napapangitan talaga ako sa ginagawa ko. I was thinking bakit ang bagal-bagal ko, bakit di ko makaya? That was a terrible practice. Those always go through people’s minds especially athletes and I think now I’m experiencing even more as an artist. Kasi ang swimming parang sige, labanan mo lang, laban lang ng laban.”</p><p>When asked about what being an Olympian means to him, Coach Guy responds thoughtfully: &quot;I was asked this question the other night and my standard answer is that I am just a regular guy. But deep down, my OLY label provides me the drive to reach higher. The real world often gets in the way, but Olympians find a way. I may not always succeed, but I always try till somehow I know I&#x27;ve contributed something significant to my community.&quot;</p><div><br/></div><div><strong>RELATED VIDEO:</strong></div><div><span class="fr-video fr-deletable fr-fvc fr-dvb fr-draggable" contenteditable="false" draggable="true"><iframe width="640" height="360" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/LGKdxFYQytE??si=r9ZJYC5MiC1R76q_&amp;wmode=opaque&amp;rel=0" frameBorder="0" allowfullscreen="" class="fr-draggable"></iframe></span><br/></div>

<p>René Concepción, a former Olympic swimmer for the Philippines, is making waves once again—this time at the Paris 2024 Olympic Museum as a featured artist in the "Olympians Artists" program.</p>

René Concepción, a former Olympic swimmer for the Philippines, is making waves once again—this time at the Paris 2024 Olympic Museum as a featured artist in the "Olympians Artists" program.

René Concepción: Olympian artist shines at Paris 2024 Olympic museum | ABS-CBN

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René Concepción: Olympian artist shines at Paris 2024 Olympic museum

René Concepción: Olympian artist shines at Paris 2024 Olympic museum

Marilyn Rayray,

ABS-CBN News

Published Aug 02, 2024 12:43 AM PHT

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