The Art of shaping your own body as installation: aesthetics of the fitness model.

REVEALING ALL - THE ART OF FITNESS MODEL, THE ENIGMATIC KYLE CARY-SMITH

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As someone who devoted his whole life to the socio-cultural practice and discourse of visual art, and reflecting on it as philosopher, sociologist and psychologist of culture and art, I was intrigued to find that there is another universe and world where individuals also devote themselves to aesthetics. We find in art individuals such as Ono, Abramovic, et al who present aspects of themselves, their lives and actions as if it is art, the lives of those who populate the world of the fitness model are 100% determined by their art. Not only by the fact that they exercise almost every day of the week, but also by what they eat, the amount they eat and how often they eat - in other words, they create their bodies, muscles and sinews themselves.

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The fitness model's entire lifestyle is determined by his aim to realize his aesthetic principles. He creates and modifies his own body to achieve his aim and not only perform certain actions with his body as is the case with performance artists. The actions he execute with his body determine what the different parts of his body will become and appear like. He himself is both the creator as well as the installation and all elements the installation consist of.

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Kyle is 178cms and weighs 82- 88kgs. He follows a strict regime in what he eats, how much and when he eats -

but let the man speak for himself:

"I eat 7 times a day. My diet is high in protein, I have a whey protein shake and 150 grams of chicken as a protein source in my meals, with a cup of brown rice and almond nuts. Lots of spinach and green vegetables too. The Supplements I use are why protein, and pre-workout energy drinks. I prefer to use food than rely on supplements."

His daily exercises are carefully selected so as to work with certain parts of his body, or rather the muscles those parts consist of .



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This image shows him training one set of muscles. He told me, "I train one body part a session to focus on the muscle. So I may do my back one day, then chest the next day followed by my arms. I have no set routine....I like to go by how my body feels. But I make sure I train everything, all muscles, at least once a week." He continued, "I train about 40 minutes abs and cardio in the mornings leading up to competition and 1hr 15 minutes weight training in the evenings after work."

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A typical day in the life of Kyle is as follows, remember he is studying to be a chartered accountant and passed Honnours accounting last year - I was thinking of questions all of us wish to ask from someone who appears like ancient Greek statues, where men appeared like Gods, or Michelangelo's David.

How many meals do you have a day? And, what are examples of what you eat and drink at each meal. What kind of exercises do you do? For how long, how sets and repetitions do they consist of? And, what do you try to do with those muscles eg define, build, split, etc.

Usually the 'life' (what they eat, how much they eat, the exercises they do ) during the year will be determined by the competitions/s . As Kyle works full time as a chartered accountant he participates in one competition annually, namely the WBFF.

A few words on the WBFF. In this case the WBFF in South Africa - http://wbffsouthafrica.com/about-us.html.

The event, which services the fitness, beauty, fashion, competitive sport, health and wellness industries, saw athletes from around the world compete for the prestigious Pro Card.

The worlds event will be held in Las Vegas on August 15 and 16.


a brief history

In the past the biggest bodybuilding and fitness Federations have adopted the concept of a four tier system. To their determent, this system downwardly promoted athletes and sustained the system. As you are aware, any athlete that came up through the system this way could go down the same way at a great financial cost and loss of self esteem.

building trust

It is the goal of the WBFF to change this archaic way of promoting the athletes and create a system that promote amateur athletes on two levels and ultimately to a professional status. This concept is the basis on which the World Body and Fitness Federation will succeed. Along with the aggressive promotions and financial rewards to the athletes/models, this concept will ensure a healthy company that eventually will become a world organization. The core management, with a strong background in entertainment and promotion, support these concepts.
forging ahead

The team has a strong understanding of the industry and will capitalize on both the strength and weakness of the current system. What this means to the athletes and models is a venue that reinforces the need to perform without the stigma of losing status or position. The system also rewards the athletes and models financially, through aggressive promotion and sponsorship. During the year, using the resources available to the WBFF, athletes will be given exposure to the public in night clubs, radio and television promotions, as well as magazine advertisement and nutritional retailers.

Location
Date & Time

CARNIVAL CITY CASINO

BRAKPAN

JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA

The last time he competed, June 2015, it was against 67 guys in one line up all fighting for the prestigious pro card.

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He might do certain exercises earlier during the year of the competition -

but as the date of the competition approaches he will change what and how much he eats and the type of exercises he does. They will have a very specific aim. As he tells me, " Training changes closer to competition in that we incorporate more cardio to help us burn more fat." Fat? that made me smile, for as we can see from these images, we want to ask "where is the fat on him? On someone like him, who appears so perfect physically."

They will usually be a member of some club, in Kyle's case it is the fitness team of ECT (https://www.facebook.com/ECT101; http://www.ectfit.co.za/) and be advised on their training and guided by someone for their diet . But let the man speak for himself: "I like to work out my own diet and training plan, as I have learned what works well for my body." And from the excellent results we see in these images, he is absolutely correct in what he says - his training plan and diet REALLY works and creates a body the rest of us mere mortals can only dream of!



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The image above shows our hero Kyle, with Jaco de Bruyn (who has WBFF Pro card, all aspire to); the latter is something like a world icon in this universe as one can see from these pages about him on Google.
Jaco de Bruyn WBFF Pro | Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/OfficialJacoDeBruyn

Jaco de Bruyn WBFF Pro. 2563102 likes · 373632 talking about this. Official fan page of South African WBFF Pro Muscle Model Jaco de Bruyn! Like for... More images for Jaco de Bruyn here https://goo.gl/jmNnEi ; and here https://goo.gl/0jQPMR.



All images in this article copyright Kyle Cary-Smith.