SYDNEY: Bringing the energy and language of the street to the stable and staid Olympics, the names 'Raygun' and 'J-Attack' will be unconventional additions to the Australian squad that travels to Paris in July and August.
The pair, known as Rachel Gunn and Jeff Dunn, were confirmed on Saturday as the country's representatives when the break team makes its Olympic Games debut later this year.
Known among beginners as “breakdancing” – a term vehemently rejected by its practitioners – it combines art and dance with acrobatic movements and was announced as part of the Paris program in late 2020.
Featuring 16 female competitors and 16 female competitors – or “B-Girls” and “B-Boys” – in Paris, the urban dance style that originated in New York's Bronx in the 1970s is set to bring a new dimension to the Olympics movement.
“Lounge is a culture, it's a way of life, it's a way of life,” Gunn says. “You have these values, you have these traditions, you have these practices.
“But it's also a community as well, so we support each other and support our own way of relating to each other.
“It's exciting, it's really amazing to be able to see the fracture pushing in this direction.”
Gunn lives a double life, working as a lecturer at Macquarie University in Sydney, while also being labeled Australia's leading B-Girl after representing the country at the World Breaking Championships in Paris in 2021 and in Seoul in 2022.
Under the name Raygun, the 36-year-old singer is doing a PhD in Cultural Studies, with her thesis focusing on the intersection between gender and Sydney's broken culture.
Dunne, or J-Attack, is a 16-year-old high school student who is set to be one of the youngest members of Australia's Olympic delegation traveling to France.
“Yes, he's a gangster,” Dunne says of his casting. “It's skating, I'm very excited, I'm thrilled, to go to the Olympics.
“This is a crazy part of my life, being able to brag about it to my friends and all that. This is crazy!”
