Football in spotlight in LA, 20 years after World Cup

LOS ANGELES, - Two decades after hosting the World Cup final between Brazil and Italy, Los Angeles is paying tribute to the global game in a show celebrating football greats like Pele, Zidane and Eto'o.

"Futbol: the Beautiful Game" at the LA County Museum of Art (LACMA) uses photos, paintings and videos to explore the fan worship of the sport's biggest stars, as well as its economic power and social and cultural impact.

One of the most arresting pieces is an Andy Warhol painting of Pele, which the artist dedicated to the Brazilian icon in 1978, three years after he joined the New York Cosmos, his last club.

For Warhol, "it was about that concept of celebrity, in the same way that he would be looking at Mick Jagger or Elizabeth Taylor," the show's curator Franklin Sirmans told AFP.

Pele was, along with Germany's Franz Beckenbauer and Dutchman Johan Cruyff, one of the stars attracted to the United States to try to popularise the sport and the North American Football League (NASL) in a country obsessed with baseball and American football.

The effort was a fiasco - the league, created in 1968, disappeared ignominiously in 1984 - but football's governing body FIFA gave the United States another chance by letting them stage the 1994 World Cup.

Despite initial criticism, the competition was a huge success, with full stadiums, well-functioning infrastructure and clear signs that Americans were actually embracing a sport that had long struggled to catch on here.

A year later, Major League Football (MLS) was born. The professional league has gone from strength to strength in the two decades since then.

Memories of 1994

The 1994 World Cup takes centre stage in the LACMA show, showcasing the dramatic Brazil-Italy final where Roberto Baggio's missed penalty allowed the South Americans to win the global championship for the fourth time.

Other memorable moments included Argentine star Diego Maradona being kicked out for a positive drug test. Colombian defender Andres Escobar was killed when he returned home, after scoring an own goal that ended his team's run in the competition.

A painting by artist Carolyn Castano is dedicated to Escobar.

Then there is the film "Zidane: a 21st Century Portrait" by Frenchman Philippe Parreno, in which 17 cameras follow every move by Zinedine Zidane - a French national icon - over 90 minutes of a 2005 match.

Maradona's infamous "Hand of God" moment that sank England in Mexico in 1986 is also turned into art, alongside a painting of Cameroon forward Samuel Eto'o at the 2010 World Cup.

The exhibition reflects some of the darker sides of the beautiful game, including fan violence and the power of money.

And there is humour - Mexico's Miguel Calderon stitches together video clips of his national side from a string of matches against Brazil.

But he only chooses flattering bits of footage. The final score? Mexico, 17. Brazil, 0.

The fans are represented in their own 90-minute audiovisual montage, showing Brazilian supporters singing, suffering, holding their heads in their hands and jumping with joy.

"You learn so many things about life in football, in the stadiums," said Sirmans.

Or, as famous French existentialist writer - and goalkeeper - Albert Camus once said: "After many years in which the world has afforded me many experiences, what I know most surely about morality and obligations, I owe to football."