Rob McLeish is fascinated by the image of the gymnast, returning to it constantly in recent years in drawing, collage and sculpture. He sees in gymnastics the tension between the aspiration for universal perfection and the inevitability of bodily decay. In Gainer (2014), a gymnastics term referring to the act of performing a backwards somersault whilst moving forward, images of gymnasts, silkscreened on sheets of white coated aluminium, are twisted and turned, replicating their movement when in full flight. The violence and severity of the crumpling acts as a metaphor for the tension and stress that both the body and the equipment it is engaged with are placed under during a routine. The positioning of these folded sheets as supports for the larger steel structures to which they are attached is a further analogy of the fine line between perfection and decay. The dexterity and contorted image of the gymnast