Breakdancing is considered one of the five elements of hip-hop culture, which celebrated its 51st birthday on Sunday, August 11, along with MCing, DJing, knowledge, and the visual art form graffiti. At the Paris Olympics that concluded on Sunday, for the first time, breakdancing was an Olympic sport. The results reflect the globalization of hip-hop.
Philip Kim, also known as Phil Wizard, a native of Toronto, Canada, who was also raised in Vancouver, took home gold. Danis Civil of France, who also goes by the moniker Dany Dann, won silver and American Victor Montalvo of Kissimmmee, Florida earned a bronze. On the women’s side, Ami Yuasa of Japan captured the gold, Dominika Banevič of Lithuania seized the silver medal, and Liu Qingyi of China won bronze.
Opinions about breakdancing in the Olympics, which as of now is not slated to be at the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, varied, from being praised to criticized as being not worthy of an Olympic sporting event.
The Amsterdam News spoke exclusively with world-renown breakdancer Jorge “Popmaster Fabel” Pabon, who began his career in the early 1980s and was featured in the pioneering hip-hop cult classic film “Beat Street,” about the physical and mental skills it takes to be an elite breakdancer and his thoughts on it genre as an Olympic competition.
“Any B-girl, B-boy, rocker or breaker that has the aim to compete at the highest levels needs to learn the history of the dance, first and foremost,” said Pabon, who has taught popping and locking at workshops globally and for the past 25 years at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. “Secondly, they should cross-train mentally, spiritually, and physically. Learning the foundational dance steps, techniques and moves is not enough to be a top competitor.”
Pabon noted that aspiring breakdancers should consider learning the roots and history of certain African and Indigenous dance forms.
“West African dances such as the Nigerian dances of the Orishas and Senegalese cultural dance forms, Native American dance forms such as grass dances and other well-grounded movements, Afro-Caribbean dance forms such as Puerto Rican/Boriken and Cuban, Rhumba, Mambo, Bomba, Plena and Salsa, [as well as] American Black dances such as the Jitterbug/Lindy Hop, Huffing/Tap dance, [and] James Brown’s Good Foot.”
Pabon is adamant that knowledge of these creative expressions will help young dancers understand the foundation of modern art forms.
“Mixed feelings from the start,” Pabon, who was born in Spanish Harlem, said of his initial reaction when it was announced that breakdancing would be in the Paris Olympics “I was delighted that our sacred dance and culture was, once again, acknowledged as being worthy of such a prestigious platform. However, I was also concerned about cultural appropriation at its highest level.”
Pabon is ambivalent in his assessment of the breakdancing competition in Paris.
“There were some amazingly talented dancers that competed, not ‘athletes,’ as they were titled by some of the Olympic press,” he said. “However, one dancer in particular (Australian Rachael Gunn) somehow managed to be inappropriately and prematurely added to the list of competitors. Her lack of expertise and skill level seemed to have gone viral on social media and certain press. Besides this unfortunate debacle, most of the dancers were up to par and battled intensely.”
Gunn, nicknamed Raygun, whose performance at times seemed to be more parody than a serious presentation, lost her three round-robin battles by a combined score of 54-0.