[quote]SLAINGE wrote:
Have you ever noticed that ancient statues (lets use the Greek ideal as these are the inspiration for the sculptures that followed) of athletes or mythological hero’s do not have the thick bulky pec’s of modern bodybuilders? They did however have rugged, well-etched abs, thick strong midsections, thick strong muscular arms and thighs, naturally long full diamond-shaped calves, round delts, and a wide thickly muscled back. Of course exercises such as bench presses didn’t exist (why would you lie on your back to press a weight anyway?). So where did the fascination with big pecs come from, how did it develop and why has it persisted?
When people exercised in the past it was more than likely with performance in mind, be it for the arena, the military, competition or it was simply just hard labour. Providing nutrition was in order a good physique would have been a by-product of that exercise / work, which leads us on to our fascination with good physiques as it is an indication of good health but why the big tits?
Have we seen the pinnacle of muscular development, will we see a shift in what we perceive as ideal or is it just a matter of what’s in style?
Any thoughts…
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Or u can think of it like art as well, where when artists ran out of ideas over the generations, where aesthetics, beauty and symmetry is “played out” (peaked long ago), artists abandoned what’s pleasing naturally to the senses and went for the shock values, the grotesque, and etc. When the 70s bodybuilders achieved what most considered to be the ideal physique, where can the bodybuilders in the future go? Bigger, freakier, and more shocking.
But then like art history, people go back to the originals from time to time when the new ceased to shock, with a little bit of a twist. But unlike art where it’s the manifestation of mind and emotion, where creativity and imaginationary products are boundless in ideas, shape, function, and desire, you can only go so far and make so much variation with the body. So as long as drugs and exercise stradegies keep on improving, bodybuilders will always try to get bigger, or go back to focusing on aesthetic like Zyzz did…but yea, you get my point.
Either way, no matter how big we get though, the bodies of the future are still going to be more or less the extention of the natural, functional body. What I mean is that you are probably not going to see bodybuilders in the future train only one leg or one side of the body or chest only, and etc.