Gonadman

Who doesn't love surf art? Now the genius that is Mark Sutherland is available on a convenient T-shirt via gonadman.com. You can also sign up for the monthly strip to be sent to you. Stoked. The photo is from another Australian, Paul the Simfreak. I could stand a setup like this.

Ether Monthly #10- Stanley Pleskunas

Stanley Pleskunas, Central Cal 2005.
Photo Kidman from 'Ether', available by emailing info at foamandfunction.com

Pleskunas is another of those low key San Diego garage geniuses. He's affected your surfing whether you know it or not. He's designed simple shaping tools that are still the best for the job, he's worked on outrageously complex shaping machine designs. He builds 'Wibbulators', wild, thin and flexy boards that evolved from the cutting edge kiteboards he makes. He was also there at the birth of the fish. From the interview in 'Ether' conducted by Kidman and Kenvin.

AK: Can you tell us the whole story about the board in the cave?
SP: My memories of it are: it was a cold day and the surf was big. It was probably Christmas, and we'd just gotten short johns, the first wetsuits. Stevie (Lis) and I went out at Osprey. It was big; I was haired out, but I had to go. There was a guy out surfing, the tide was coming in, he lost his board and it went in the cave. It was too gnarly to go in there nd get it, especially without a pair of fins on. The guy swam in and he got out of the water, and we knew he left the board in the cave. So the next day the surf dropped, and we went down there , and we pulled the longboard out of the cave . We got a hammer under the glass and we peeled the glass off-worst itch I've ever had in my life! Then we sawed it in half, and then Stevie shaped a board and I shaped a board. He got the nose; he had the better rocker (laughs). Mine was terrible. That was the piece of foam that Stevie built the first fish from, that I remember. It was a bright red Fish. This first one had, kind of, spiky pins on it and it was really thin, double lap; black fins. Sort of peaky fins: a fin with a little tip on it, about the same base as it was high. I remember him surfing that, on the lefts at South Beach, and just ... ripping. That board was probably 4',4'2". Stevies a small guy, y'know?

RK: How about your first exposure to Greenough?
SP: The thing that nailed me was the article with Nat Young, Bob McTavish and George at Honolua. They had pictures of George riding. I was kneeboarding, and I'd heard rumors of him, right, and when I saw those pictures then I immediately tried to emulate, and shape, and build boards, and look for information. I mined information from everybody I knew, to try and figure out what those boards were and why they worked. I started building a few. I think, at the same time, that thing really kicked off the board building craze here y'know? The back yard thingin our area. I think, more than anybody in our area, I was kinda more on George's thing than some of the other people. Stevie was building the Fishes, and people understood what was going on by then, with Steve. But I was more on George's thing.

Jon Wegener Blogs!

Nice. Jon Wegener, definitely one of the top ten nicest men in surfing, is blogging. Now that summer is creeping on, many a youngster's thoughts turn to hot days and little souths wrapping onto pointbreaks, and of course the alaias they plan on riding. Here's the source for the woody goodness. Those of us who are happy with the sideways slide we get with fins are still welcome, Jon shapes a mean foam craft. Still got some t-shirts too, I'm wearing one as I type and feel pretty good about it all.

Kevlar rails, cold and a setup

Once again, thanks to Mick Mackie for providing some excellent imagery. I certainly could use that wave, but he's welcome to the roof of snow. Mad bastards to be wandering around in that stuff, but that's an Australian for you. I'm off for a surf finally.

The Fish in it's glory...

Some time ago a surfshop owner told me the fish was 'over'. His logic was that everybody who wanted one had one by now, lots of people found them harder to ride than they expected and as it was a 'retro' board it wasn't one that was being replaced or upgraded in anyone's quiver. Never really was comfortable with that concept, and here's a selection of relatively current fish I've seen that vary from classic to ultra modern that I believe prove there's life in 'em yet. I've been having fun on one the last few weeks anyway.

Hynd Bushrat, worth clicking on to see the art.


Redwood Simmons inspired quad! SWEET! By Jeff Beck at Ninelights


Daniel Thomson quiver. Indeed.


Sidecut polisher's nightmare from Rob Royal.


Pure candy from Hank Warner. I'm going to go out on a limb and say Hank is basically THE man for an old school fish. He makes what I've found to be a magic board.


My other magic fish is of course a Mackie. This is someone else's magic fish, a textured deck sidecut I wish I'd been able to keep.


Check the water flow slot in this one from Reverb, and then check how nice that outline is.


Eli Mirandon made this 4" agave stringer job. It was the board I wanted most at the Ventura Sacred Craft show, felt absolutely perfect under the arm.


Sorry, an obvious shot but stuffed with lemon and rubbed with sea salt and oil then grilled, they were delicious.

Suave Garments

The ongoing winter of swell is still with us, another week of what were by all accounts decent waves but I only had a mere taste of it as the storage space needed attention so it was a week of labour. That's not really a complaint, maybe just a little whimper- there's been plenty of surf for all and an annoying task is dealt with. In the process I dragged out the last of the hoodies, as seen above. There's Simmons in heather, brown and black, OG Swift in heather or brown, Mackie in black and I believe a few Bernoulli equation in brown. All are front zip lightweight hoodies, ideal for the chill of early AM session, and $35 each. There's Casper shirts as well, blue for the ladies, seafoam green for the gents, very quantities numbers left so get 'em now, $25 each. Email info at foamandfunction.com or check the Foam& Function site, there's more shirt designs there and stocks are getting low. Fingers crossed the rain holds off until later in the day tomorrow and I may get a session in.

Tomo in Japan

Daniel Thomson has been a bit of a one man show of late. He turned up at Sacred Craft with just a banner and an armful of boards and blew people's minds, he's shaped and surfed a lot lately, and most recently turned up in Japan at a trade show with more boards but a rack and another banner this time- moving up in the world. Axxxe wetsuits helped him out, and they deserve whatever little plug I'm giving them as they make a damn fine custom wetsuit.

Aaaaah

And again from Carl. 6'0" this time, boxes are an option.

Mmmmmm

Ekstrom. Doing it so old school that it's new school.

Ether Monthly #9- Art

Some of Andrew Kidman's screen print art, processed from images taken for the film 'Glass Love' and several photos featured in 'Ether'. There are framed originals of some of these pieces available and thre's a section of this work in 'Ether', which is in itself a limited piece signed and numbered art. A piece of art with a 10" record, but a piece of art none the same.

Little Black Wheels & Australian Efficiency

Down there on the sunny east coast of Australia, our mate Mick Waters has been quietly getting on with it all and deserves congratulations for two new deliveries. One is the proverbial bouncing baby (now months old- I'm late on things as always) and the other is the new film. 'Believe' was a very nice addition to the canon of surf film, and this new effort looks like another beauty in a similar vein (nice wave Mick Hughes is getting there too.) I'm hassling Mick to get copies of 'Little Black Wheels'and maybe a restock of 'Believe' too, so if you're interested let me know. Here's a link to an interview with Mr. Waters. Nice work indeed, and as one who's paternal relatives ran timber scows on the Murray for years, I wish a little of that Australian efficiency would show up in my character.

Thread Monthly #5- The Shirt

The movie and the book now have a shirt. A lot more user friendly than the 'Sketchy Business' shirts we used as tour merch (check the archives, there's an excellent shot of the svelte and lovely Ando Davis wearing one back in May 09 somewhere) and of the highsartorial standard you've come to expect from this group of people. Available through Trefz very soon. I have a few prints from the book, framed by SF legend Peter Kirkeby and all at what I believe will be a very reasonable price. Trefz promises he has a film on the way which is good news.

Surf & Tea

Some of you, like myself, may have seen Gerry Wedd's work in a Surfer's Journal article and had your interest piqued. He's had this blog going for while with a lot of ceramic work there, and it's really amazing stuff. There's a definite surfy element to what he does (He was involved in Mambo clothing for a while too) but it transcends being 'surf art'. That said, I really love the series of tiles with portraits of the great surfers on them- beautifully done and there's a nice sense of humor to it all, as you can see from the non ceramic related posts he's made. He's playing with some really interesting approaches to a traditional craft style, something I like a lot when it's done well and Mr. Wedd is certainly doing that. The man knows how to make a good looking teapot which is a wonderful art, and as an unashamed tea drinking obsessive (3 to 4 pots a day on top of the morning coffee) I'd also like like to direct your attention another favourite of mine, the Tea Appreciation Society, mad limeys though they may be, it's a fun way to while away a few minutes. My thanks to Kidman and Manny Caro for unwittingly steering me to this stuff too. Better yet the waves have been good and the weather lovely so I'm in full work/responsibility avoidance mode.

Domo Arigato Mackie San

Mick Mackie has sent snapshots from his visit to Hokkaido no less. Clueless as I may be about snow stuff, these bindingless swallowtail snowsurf boards look like some serious sort of fun. The level of board sport interchange is really nuts, the snowskate guys have been working the same basic line of thought from a skateboard angle, and the crossover with Mick's high tech flex fish is obvious.
...And furthermore, 3 days down the line I get an edifying email from Mr. Mackie himself. It seems I'm truly utterly clueless about the snowboard side of it all. Those boards do indeed have bindings (you can see 'em for chrissakes!). They are still totally awesome looking, and they're made by a company on Hokkaido called Gentemstick, the one on top is a Rocketfish and the one below a Spoonfish which makes sense just looking at them. Gentemstick have a pretty nice website here, their whole deal seems pretty epic- living a snow/surf lifestyle on Hokkaido, and living it with serious style.



Meanwhile I have this 5'9" on hand should anyone feel like acquiring some sidecut flextail magic, at pre-currency crash prices no less. These boards are a revelation for the fish enthusiast.

Lance Mountain's house last week.

G.E.F. kept himself busy while out west. Lance and Pat Ngoho sessioning as hard as any teenager makes me happy, and how's this as a backyard setup?

At Last, Last Hope

Finally have copies. It's a collection of short films about the sea by some of the more interesting surf film makers out there. Not so much a surf film collection but there is surfing in there. Music from the roster of bands on Spunk/Drag City. Perfect for a rainy day like the one that's happening now- chilly, sore shoulders from good sessions this past week, pot of Earl Grey or maybe Lapsang and this on the picture box. Perfect. You can have yours for $25, US shipping included, by emailing me at info @ foamandfunction.com.

Oh the fun we have...

Shiny surfboards, entertaining potpourri of folks, Alva DJing 5 hours straight the first night, couple of fun surfs- That's a good time. Some juicy surfboard portraits coming soon when I'm less sleep deprived. A big thanks to caffeine for all it's good work the last few days.

Yard Possum Roll Call