Athletes run for culture launch

Lord Coe runs through the Tate Britain gallery

Olympic gold medallist Dame Kelly Holmes has been transformed into a work of art to launch the Cultural Olympiad.

She joined other past Olympians in a special performance of Martin Creed's work No 850 at London's Tate Britain.

The former Turner Prize-winner's art installation sees a runner sprint through the site's neo-classical sculpture galleries every 30 seconds.

The £40m Cultural Olympiad will showcase the UK's arts and culture in the run up to the 2012 Olympic Games.

It kicked off with a series of events across the country, including the performance of Creed's No 850 at Tate Britain.

Dame Kelly was joined by other past Olympic athletes, including Iwan Thomas, triple jumper Jonathan Edwards, and Lord Coe - the 1980 and 1984 1500-metre Olympic champion and London 2012 Olympic Organising Committee chairman - for the special performance.

Each runner was greeted by ripples of applause from the waiting public.

Lord Coe said: "It was really great. It was lovely and there was a very enthusiastic audience.

Dame Kelly won two gold medals at the 2004 Olympics

"I came here a few weeks ago and I just thought I would be very happy to be part of that."

Triple-jump world record holder Jonathan Edwards said: "I absolutely loved it. It is a great mix of art and sport and I just loved running down the marble hall of Tate Britain."

Dame Kelly told the BBC it was "great" to be part of an event which mixes sport with culture.

"For me personally, sport is something that captures the imagination of everybody, but also what we have [culture] is very unique in this country," she said.

"It means no matter what background you're from, you can be part of this whole experience and we want everybody to be united.

"I think by doing media, culture, art and sport, that's what we have to do. And it's great to be part of an event that's promoting the cultural Olympiad."

'Worthwhile challenge'

Across the UK, more than 600 cultural events will take place this weekend to kick off the Olympiad.

They include:

• An urban arts workshop, including MCing, beatboxing, urban/hip hop dance, at the Wales Millennium Centre, in Cardiff.

We can hopefully change a few attitudes through sport towards culture Lord Coe

• Bradford's Centenary Square is being transformed into a giant open-air dance space with break dancers, hip-hop artists, Russian dancers, aerial acrobatics, and live DJs.

• A duet between a dancer and 13-tonne mechanical digger at Sheffield's Devonshire Green.

Lord Coe accepted that it will be a "challenge" to maintain enthusiasm until 2012 but said there was a wealth of arts and cultural offerings which would make it worthwhile.

He said: "It will be a challenge but I'm thinking that it is not that insuperable because what we have in this country is a creative raft of people who want to take part.

"We can hopefully change a few attitudes through sport towards culture."