Parkour: is it an artform or a sport?

Parkour, is it an art form or is it a sport?

Is Parkour an art form, I am a parkour experience I feel it is an art form but I want to hear other people's opinions on it. It's similar to things like martial arts form example, kung Fu. I will be searching over the internet on different websites and speaking to people in the parkour community.

The word Parkour derives from the French word Parcours, this means course. Parkour is a way of moving rapidly through an area, typically in an urban environment, negotiating obstacles by running, jumping, and climbing. Some people refer to it as an art form, "any activity regarded as a medium of imaginative or creative self-expression". While others believe it falls under the category of a sport- "an activity involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or team competes against another or others for entertainment". Looking at the definitions I am starting to believe that it is falling under the art form category, but then again it could fall under the sport category as well.

Imaginative, for those who don't know much about parkour you might not realise the imagination is one skill you will need to be able to do it.

When you train in a new environment you will be forced to step outside your comfort zone and try new things. New environments does not only mean a new city or a new country. It could be training in the forest or at some rocks at the beach. In parkour you need imagination and creativity to make the flows or lines that you want to run. Learning how to flow things together will make you faster, stronger and better in some areas. So you do need imagination therefore in my opinion it is an art form.

Sport, in parkour you can definitely physically exert yourself. This can happen by the amount of moves you do in one flow to how many tries it takes you to get a jump. It can also class as a sport now because they hold competitions within this style of movement. Red Bull Art of Motion is a freerunning competition held in various countries such as England, Kuwait, the US, and Sweden. Judging of the event is based on several criteria including creativity, flow, execution, and difficulty. This shows that parkour is a competitive sport, however although it fits into the definition of sport category some people believe that it's still more of an artform. While I have been doing my research I have come across and article from The Guardian online. This article states that we in Britain are the first country to recognise parkour as a sport. In the article it says that parkour has had recognition from all five of the UK sports councils, this suggests that people are starting to realise that parkour isn't actually a bad thing. Eugene Minogue, the chief of Parkour UK has said that the sport has finally been recognised as a sport. However there are some risks with classifying that it's a sport, as standards and quality assurance frameworks will be applied. Paul states in the book "the cultural politics of lifestyle sports" that "is it possible to accredit an artistic discipline without losing its creativity". After reading all of this and seeing this research on the sport I am more toward this side now. I am very happy that it has been accredited and noticed and I also am happy that they can teach it in schools because it has been recognised by the Youth Sport Trust and the Association for Physical Education. This is also good because it raises awareness for parkour.

Many classify parkour as an artform, which is defined as any activity regarded as a medium of imaginative or creative self-expression. As I have previously stated you definitely need the imagination to be able to do parkour. This could be related to martial arts because that is an artform too. They have similar qualities such as the both need really good balance, strength, stamina and fluidity. Therefore some could argue it could fall under the same category as an artform. The parkour founders that originated in France at first thought it was a "sell out" to call it an artform (The Cultural Politics of lifestyle sports- Belinda Wheaton) however they then came round to the idea because they recognised that parkour performances in festivals and street theatre helped to publicise parkour in a more positive way. I also agree to some extent that it's an artform because of the similarities to the other artforms such as martial arts, however I do feel that by classifying it as an art it is being exposed to different groups and artistic styles.

To conclude Parkour, is it an artform or is it a sport: I believe it can fall under both categories because I have seen evidence to support both and they have convinced me that it doesn't have to be the one it can be both. I believe that parkour is an artform and a sport. I don't think that it should classify as either as well because I don't think it should just be classed as one thing it should be both because classifying it as one would mean it is limiting it to one thing.