Prophecy 1970-2019



Yes, it they were supposed to blow minds. Both of these images. The artwork is Rick Griffin’s 1970 masterpiece which was a poster for the seminal surf movie of the time “Pacific Vibrations”. A film that explored the themes of the hallucinogenic movements of the era. A time when imagination ruled surfing. Where “Futuristic” boards and designs reigned our earth. A time that inspired everything from open minds to blown minds, of space boards and being spaced out. A wildly productive time that hurdled the evolution of surfing into the collective conscious stratosphere. An influence that still resonates today. An influence that has led to the unimaginable, no matter how many drugs were taken back then.

Foil surfing. Surfing above the waves, flying really, perhaps to achieve the purest connection a surfer has ever had with a wave’s kinetic powers. Jimi Hendrix dreamed of it with his “Axis Bold as love”. Connecting his guitar into the energy that leads to the center of the earth. Billy Kemper, right, is living it with his axes that propel him into an otherworldly realm that is certainly as bold as any love coming from the center of our oceans. Still relevant, Griffin’s poster serves as an inspiration to anyone who is willing to see just how far their mind can go in surfing. After all, filmaker John Severson’s original idea was to “bring an awareness to the changes I was witnessing happen to the ocean… this is a film that in the end makes a statement that would maybe prompt a few people to take action and start doing something”. Prompt people to take action and start doing something. We have been doing it ever since”. Indeed.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

CAUGHT INSIDE # 128

Image
Sea Dreams. We all have them. And we are bringing some more to you in this new issue of Surftime Magazine. Consider the photo on the right. Can you see it? Really see it? The dreams that are scrawled on that dream machine? A child’s sea dreams for all the world to see. A homegrown machine hewn out of the scraps of a snapped board washed up on the beach. The homegrown logos, scrawled with such passion, misspellings and reversals and all. A physical manifestation of passion and desire. The passion for surfing and the desire to belong to the tribe. If this surfer couldn’t get his hands on a real dream board, then let the surf Gods be damned, he would make it himself. The real stuff of sea dreams in a single image. We have a lot of other images of dreams for you too. Take the cover with Tai Graham, once again in the center of perfection at some remote secret spot of his. As always making his sea dreams come true. And even more so as we let him pick the color scheme for the cover itself
Read more

CAUGHT INSIDE # 130

Image
The question is can we keep it up? The answer is yes, as long as, like a satellite in outer space, we can keep our orbit from decaying. Our orbit being the entire biomass system of tourists and waves that keep the island of Bali’s heart beating. Right now the best we can do is deal with it. But dealing with something means having it in hand. Which we barely do. What happens when we lose our grip? One need only look at the shortcut in Canggu to see what kind of inhuman chaos ensues. The answer? For everyone on earth to be thoughtful. Which millions of years on earth has proven impossible. It’s just not in our survival mode. So what’s next? Circle the wagons, I guess. Take our surfing world, observe our orbit’s momentum and health and keep it in hand. And we have such a wonderful orbit happening. But now, with the steamrolling effect of greed tourism and irresponsible development sounding like a death knell, it’s time to look at Bali’s surfing healthspan rather than its lifespan. Th
Read more

MEDEWI: Life by the side of the skeleton road

Image
It is late afternoon. That time of day on any west coast where the color of the sea and the land contract into vivid hues and shadows begin to crawl east like living things and a golden path rises from the sea and leads to the sun. You are at the surf break of Medewi Point on the island of Bali, far from the tourist madness to the south and you can see alpha local Muklis Anwar and his covey of wet, shiny, local kids crabbing their way toward shore over the slippery boulders on the inside of the surf break. A misstep here and any one of them will receive a spray of urchin spines deep into the front pads of their feet and nothing more than a sewing machine needle to dig them out with. Muklis has been teaching the village kids how to surf and the kids hold under their arms all manner of relic surfboards. Chunked, split and repaired, cast away like dolls without heads by the western visitors of this place over the decades. Yet these boards are gold to the humble, to be smelted and re-
Read more