Angelo Dominic Sesto doesn’t break rules — he uses them like scaffolding. Within the bounds of his hyper-developed self-discipline, earned from years as a high-level competitive gymnast, is boundless creative potential. “It teaches you a way of understanding yourself and your body and who you are as a person on such an interesting level,” said Sesto. Now, as one of London’s most exciting new photographers, it’s got an entirely new outlet.
Lessons in discipline started early. “I was pretty lively,” said Sesto, now 27, of his hyperactive childhood. To contain his endless energy, his mother — a fan of Olga Korbut, the Soviet gymnast whose risky backflips at the 1972 Olympics were so radical they were later banned — enrolled him at a recreational gym in Camden, close to Sesto’s hometown. “It was for me to go away for a few hours and keep myself occupied.” Though he also played soccer, it was in his gymnastic ability that coaches spotted something rare. Soon, Sesto’s preternatural talent had him winning local competitions. By age 11, he had given up soccer to join South Essex Gymnastics Club, an elite program that allowed him to train alongside the likes of Max Whitlock, winner of gold in both floor and pommel horse at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio.
Sesto quickly leveled up to the demands of an elite, regimented and punishing training schedule, where success was governed by strict codes of form, ability and execution and often decided by tenths of a point. Every movement had to be exact, whether it was a pommel horse flare or a soaring vault with a blind landing.
Within the rigid structure, something else was taking shape. Sesto was contorting his body into lines, arcs and angles — not just for points, but for beauty. He was beginning to channel the precision of his idol, Japanese gymnast Kohei Uchimura. “I think even calling it a sport is interesting,” said Sesto, “because it feels more expressive than most sports.” In fact, he went on, that’s “why it’s called artistic gymnastics.” For him, the mat became a stage for competition — and creative composition.
At 16, he made it to the 2013 British national championships. It would also be his last competition.
Sesto was injury-prone, he said, and a nagging elbow that refused to heal finally proved to be too much. “I could do amazing things, but I had to let go, and I had to find something else,” he said. Sesto applied to City and Islington College (now Capital City College) in Islington, London, where he decided to study media, photography and music production.
Around that time, a close friend got him into skateboarding, which helped shift his relationship to sports and physical activity. No more grueling schedule, just spontaneous exercise. “I can just go out at any time and skateboard wherever I want to?” he said, remembering the realization. “There’s no plan; there was freedom.” And yet, he said, “You still had to move and engage your body, which was good for my brain at that time.”
Skating also offered an aesthetic pathway. Brands like Supreme and its orbiting visual artists, the music — the entire subculture fascinated Sesto.
After a couple chance encounters, Sesto’s future began lining up. In 2015, he got a gig as a videographer for Madonna’s Rebel Heart tour. He has since shot for Vogue Paris and Office magazine, directed videos for avant-pop musician iagö, and collaborated on art-meets-music projects with rapper Little Simz, DJ Tommy Gold and multidisciplinary creative Slawn for PLAYERS.
Now, he’s returning to gymnastics — with a spin. For the past year and a half, he’s been working closely with movement director Sem Osian on A Movement Study: Vol. 1. With it, said Sesto, they can develop a new visual language for the body, one that bridges the clean lines of sport with the expressive looseness of dance. “That obsession with rigidity, I think it’s just embedded in me,” he said. Rigidity is another word for rules, which help set limitations on what’s possible in any given area. Once you’ve identified the rules, or what’s not possible, he said, you are free to explore endlessly within them. “There’s something about putting things in a confined space, both visually and conceptually,” said Sesto. “There’s comfort there.”
For this issue, PLAYERS tapped Sesto for Passion, an ongoing visual series that explores what happens when artists unleash their creativity within the parameters of whatever game they’re playing. For issue two, Sesto traveled back to his old training grounds, something he’d avoided for years, both to figure out why and to explore the memories he made there.
“It was about looking within and understanding where I’ve been and confronting those things,” said Sesto.
On shoot day, he found himself returning to the rules, and as he did, the tools he’d acquired as a gymnast were suddenly crystal clear: “It’s kind of like a coping mechanism.”
He added,“It felt like one of those big moments, where I’m just beginning to peek under a stone I left untouched for a long time.”
Citius, Altius, Fortius is the result of that peek: a photographic series in which Sesto stages a dialogue between who he was and who he is becoming.
