If you've ever ugly-cried at a "Dance Moms" elimination round or felt genuinely invested in whether a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader made the squad - first of all, no judgment, and second of all, Maya Man has made an art show specifically for your brain.
The unlikely muse
Man's new exhibition, covered by i-D, draws its DNA from the hyper-competitive, sequin-drenched world of competitive dance and professional cheerleading. We're talking the kind of televised ambition that most serious art critics would probably cross the street to avoid. And that's exactly the point.
Because here's the thing about those shows - they are genuinely fascinating documents of what it looks like when women and girls are taught to want stardom so badly they can taste the rhinestones. The stakes feel absurd from the outside, and completely life-or-death from the inside. That tension is rich territory.
What the exhibition actually does
Rather than poking fun at its subjects, Man's work seems genuinely curious about the mechanics of "making it" - the rituals, the aesthetics, the specific flavour of female ambition that gets packaged, performed, and judged in front of cameras. The exhibition's title itself - "Starquest Starbound Starpower" - reads like a competition category at a junior dance championship, which is very much the vibe.
Man is interested in how the desire for recognition gets shaped, trained, and commodified, particularly for girls and young women. Reality TV competition shows are basically a masterclass in that process, and the cheerleading world doubles down on it. You want to be a star? Great. Now let us score you on it.
Why this matters beyond the sequins
It's genuinely smart to take this stuff seriously as cultural material. "Dance Moms" and Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders content isn't lowbrow noise - it's a pretty unfiltered window into how ambition, body image, perfectionism, and visibility all collide in a very specific corner of American femininity. That's worth examining, not dismissing.
Man clearly gets that the line between sincere investment and camp appreciation is blurry and interesting, and lives right there in that blurriness rather than picking a lane. The result is an exhibition that sounds like it rewards both the person who watched every season of "Dance Moms" and the person who has never heard of it.
Honestly, the real artistic flex here is making a gallery show that title-drops Abby Lee Miller's extended universe and gets away with it completely. Respect.
Read the full interview with Maya Man over at i-D.
