Medieval Tennis
Sporties is my graduation project as part of my Academie Minerva illustration degree. In my project I relive historical sports and illustrate the characters that used to play them. My fascination starts with the rapid development of Sports in human culture, in the last 100 years or so. What used to be a way of recreation became a business and a culture of it's own. With the social development came the visual development of Sports. Jersey design, sport accessories, stadiums, televisions and marketing captured the sports we love to play and watch. But what about sports before the fame and glory?
There is no doubt that life was difficult in Medieval Europe, it was called the “Dark Ages” after all. Disease and poverty were everywhere, the “Devil” was recruiting lots of people for his witch start-up business and going “number two” on the street was a pretty common thing. But for the world of sports those times weren’t so “dark”. Being surrounded by slaves and servants, the European social elites had lots of free time for themselves, which they largely spent playing games. One of which was "jeu de paume" - an early predecessor of tennis. The players enjoyed mostly the trickery behind the play and hated the routine of starting the each play. Servants of the kings and princes started hitting the starting balls, creating the term "serve" that is still used today.
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