OPENING: Thursday 7th November 2024, 6pm
VENUE: Ulster Sports Club, The Committee Room, 96-98 High Street, Belfast, BT1 2BG
CLUB [CONSTRUCTION] vs ULSTER SPORTS CLUB! is a solo exhibition and immersive installation by QSS artist Reuben Brown. It originates from a fascination with the close proximity between avant-garde queer club communities and heterosexual, working-class sports clubs found in industrial Western European port cities. This show explores the unexpected cultural intersections that arise when these seemingly opposing worlds collide.
Inspired by a queered reading of Jean-Pierre Faye’s ‘Horseshoe Theory,’ the installation blends the props, codes, and practiced pageantry of hyper-masculine sports culture with the camp extravagance of queer masculinity, diva-worship, and club spaces. Faye’s theory suggests that extreme opposites, like hyper-male heterosexuality and flamboyant queer masculinity, curve toward each other, revealing surprising parallels in their theatricality and performance.
Through a mix of sculptural interventions and experimental films, the exhibition examines the rehearsed masculinity and rituals of sports spectatorship alongside the spectacle of diva-worship and queer machismo—set against the backdrop of internalised homophobia. Placed strategically in the Ulster Sports Club’s Committee Room bar, this work invites audiences to take a seat, observe, and witness the ways these contrasting worlds fold into each other in unexpected ways.