Art is a sport, sport is an art. Both demand hustle — and make life worth living

I love reading about artists’ processes and routines. Toni Morrison wrote before dawn, before her children awoke and she had to go to her publishing job. In the evenings, Maya Angelou cleaned and put away all her dishes before she sat with what she had written that morning. Louise Bourgeois only worked in complete silence. These rules and routines are reminders that art takes work — and immense amounts of energy.

I grew up with parents who are also artists and had to find time for their projects between life and daily obligations. My father wrote in the early mornings; my mother painted in the hours after lunch and before we were done with school. It normalized for me the intentional carving out of time needed for writing, reading and creating. This has meant that I’m almost always busy doing something, and sometimes tired, but when I don’t carve that time, I’m guaranteed to be in a bad mood, like the hanger that comes from skipping a meal.

In Viv Chen’s interview with Tory Burch, the designer compares her workdays to being “like an athlete where it’s about discipline and grit and endurance.” It’s a sentiment that sums up much of the spirit of this issue, which looks at art as a sport and sport as an art. Whether you’re playing fútbol, sewing clothes or staging a performance, it’s a physical as well as mental game.

Above all, the artist-athletes in these pages show us the rewards of their commitments. We witness this in the sizzling images of Tory Burch shoes pounding the hot Los Angeles pavement and in the sportswear designs that Otis students worked on for months, the results literally glowing and electric. We witness this in the portraits of Betye Saar, regally dressed in a Gucci kaftan for what will likely be the last exhibition she’s involved in during her lifetime. We witness this in the image of our fútbol queen on the cover, strong, reverent and at peace. These stories are all reminders that dedication to one’s craft is not just life-giving, it’s what makes life worth living.