Meet the Fattylympian: Billiard Savage

Who are you?
I am Billiard Savage!

What does the Fattylympics mean to you?
Refusing to play along by playing differently. Recognising the intersections between fat, class, race, gender and sexuality and how the You Know Whats are being/have been used to regulate all those things in various combinations. Doing something fun and absurd. Making your own culture.

What's the best thing you can do with your body?
An impersonation of an egg in a shirt and tie.

Who would you most like to invite to the Fattylympics, and why?
I would like to invite two other majestically egg-shaped people: Alfred Hitchcock and Wyatt Riot. I reckon they’d have a good time.

Egg or Spoon?
Egg, obviously.

What else would you like to say?
Greetings to Fattylympians everywhere!

Are you a Fattylympian? Wanna be featured here? Get in touch: beefergrrl@hotmail.com

Medal-making is underway

Fattylympics medal-making is happening! These are a tiny fraction of the beautiful medals that people have made. Thanks to everyone at The Weigh In, Simon, Allyson and Deirdre.

There's still time to make some of your own. Bring them on the day or post them to us (email beefergrrl@hotmail.com for an address). Here's some more information about what we're looking for.

Download, print and circulate this Fattylympics Poster

Az has made a beautiful Fattylympics poster. Please download, print, and spread it around.

Fattylympics poster (.pdf, 13mb)

Games Monitor interview about fat and the Olympics

I'm really delighted to have been interviewed by the Games Monitor about fat and the Olympics, including some things about the Fattylympics.

Under the radar: Fat activism and the London 2012 Olympics: An interview with Charlotte Cooper

Everyone feels sportier when they're wearing a Fattylympics headband

We went to Berlin to take part in a European workshop about fat activism and to show off at Rebel Bellies last week. During the trip we were beyond delighted to pick up a consignment of Fattylympics towelling headbands organised by Tünya Ö, and sported here at Kotbusser Tor by her, Kori K, me and Kay.

The people of Kreuzberg have seen and done it all, but the sight of a little group of Fattylympics queers parading through the streets in headbands turned a few heads, I can assure you. The four of us agreed that wearing a headband makes you feel very sporty indeed, it's a satisfying feeling to have your head slightly compressed by the finest elasticated towelling on earth. We hope you agree that they look extremely dapper.

We will have a bunch of Fattylympics headbands to give out on the day, just so you know. When they're gone, they're gone.

Fattylympics Street Art Coming Your Way!

Pivo has made some beautiful street art for the Fattylympics and has kindly made the images available for people to download, colour and paste up. Aren't they gorgeous! There will be more images as the Fattylympics draw closer. Please print and share them where you see fit. Pivo says: "The files are A3 but people will be able to scale them down to A4 if that's as large as they can print."

Pivo continues:

"In a nutshell, I make life size portraits of people that are a response to the things that concern me and put them up on the streets where anyone can see them. Although I don't like what the concept of street art has come to stand for, I do still think it's an amazing format to challenge the use of public space and break down the barriers between art in galleries and the places real people inhabit. I founded a collective called the Caged Bird Club to put exhibitions up in the streets and celebrate the work of all the untrained but highly creative folks out there. I also design posters for other artist collectives and am interested in working with activists to develop graphics that help spread the word about things they are working on.

I live in East London but it was my friend in America who brought the Fattylympics to my attention. I was so excited to see that people were doing something that touches on all the things that terrify me about the You Know Whats (body fascism, rigid gender distinctions, gentrification or outright social cleansing, the total repression of dissent, corporate dominance, nationalism, the list unfortunately goes on) and when it was clear that it was being done in a satirical way, I immediately signed myself up.

The participatory and non-competitive nature of the Fattylympics made me think that I should incorporate some of those good DIY values into what I was able to offer. I will be creating a series of posters with all different types of people on them that people can download, colour in their own distinctive style and display in their windows, offices, schools or wherever. My hope is that they can be a way for us to proudly proclaim that actually we'd rather live our lives based on cooperation, community and amateurish fun in East London (kind of like we did back when celebrities didn't live here and nobody gave a shit about us).

Have fun colouring in!"

Pivo Fattylympics Street Art - glasses (.pdf, 414kb)

Pivo Fattylympics Street Art - hat (.pdf, 385kb)

Check out more of Pivo's work here: http://andsomeplyers.blogspot.co.uk

Where We're At

It's 83 days to go until the Fattylympics. 83, as you will know, is an auspicious number, according to Wikipedia it is the natural number following 82 and preceding 84. Whoo! Hot stuff!

This is where we're at:

Lots of people have volunteered including a brilliant musician, who has offered to compose the Fattylympics Anthem; someone in Germany who is going to make some bunting; people who want to document the day; people who want stalls; someone who is making gorgeous posters; builders and makers of all stripes. We have an official Fattylympics Torch on the way, and medals made of doughnut hair forms, and wooden disks. Kay and I have been planning the Opening and Closing Ceremonies, and we might just have enough events, more about them later. We have sublime Fattylympics mascots in the form of Egg'n'Spoon, custom Fattylympics sweatbands, and we've bought insurance too.

There's still room for more volunteers, why not offer your services?

The bad news is that we realised that the Fattylympics clashes with Pride, and probably some other things too. This is a shame. But we've decided to keep going because not everyone likes Pride, not everyone is gay, lesbian, bi or trans (true!), and maybe at least some people will prefer to be hanging out in a park in East London messing around with us.

In other news, a group of fat people in Los Angeles are going to organise their own mini sister-event in solidarity. The Fattylympics is an international affair! More about that when we have pics and video.

Finally, there's The Weigh In, a new fat-friendly social space that takes place in London once a month. Come along, no doubt there'll be some Fattylympics talk there later this week.

Over and out.