Artist and designer Jason Vivona is showing some new work this month at the Slingluff Gallery in Philly – the opening party’s this Saturday night, February 4 from 6-9pm. Stop by if you’re in town – should be a pretty sick show.  11 W. Girard in Fishtown.

Jason Vivona, recently left the fine city of San Francisco and currently resides in Providence, RI. where he paints and draws on paper, then cuts it up, stains it with wine or coffee or tea or whatever he is drinking, then sews it all back together. The end result being a completely cohesive, realized quilted image, often laced with curtural reference and satirism. he also rides his skateboards and bikes around and makes music sometimes. He was the curator for the new incarnation of 6ALLERY (Gallery 6)in downtown San Francisco,CA.

His work has been exhibited in numerous galleries across the United States, Japan and Mexico, such as 111 MINNA in SF, Museo de la Cuidad de Mexico, White Walls Gallery SF, The Museum of New Art in Detroit,New Accident Gallery (Japan), and Vitale Gallery in Florida to name a few. Although mainly in group exhibitions, his work has been featured solo at Syracuse University and 6ALLERY SF among others. Vivona’s work has been published in Juxtapoz, Transworld Skateboarding, WARP, DIW, Skyscraper, RELAX, Portland FunBook 3 and many more.

Vivona directs a portion of his energy to freelance design. In the past he’s worked for such companies as Consolidated Skateboards, Fuel TV, Arena Rock Recording Co., Innes Clothing, and Converse. Currently he is producing work for Nike 6.0, Volcom, Concrete Company (Spain), Altamont Apparel, LSR Skateboards, Welcome Skateboards and Drop City Productions acting as art director and character/set designer for new animated commercials and television programs, partnering up with Adult Swim alum and director of photography, Jeffrey Gardner and writer/photographer, Tod Brilliant.

The Quiet Life’s end of the season sale is here, act now to get some great deals on what’s left of their fall catalog.

I’m super excited to announce Booze, Dudes and Bears, a new zine of drawings, to be published with the help of the awesome folks at The Secret Headquarters. We’re going to debut it for the LA Zine Fest Feb. 19th alongside Nick Thorburn’s new zine What A Gas.

Honored to introduce Los Angeles to Chicago “image manufacturers” Nick Butcher & Nadine Nakanishi, the designer/artist/printmakers operating Sonnenzimmer, a Chicago based printmaking studio. In conjunction with their CalArts visit, Sonnenzimmer will be exhibiting a collection of works at a ONE-NIGHT-ONLY pop up exhibition hosted at the Keep A Breast loft in the Downtown LA Arts District. Please join us in welcoming Nick & Nadine to LA, add a few Sonnenzimmer prints to your collection, hang out and talk shop with fellow LA printmakers.

 Image Manufacturing from Chicago
A Sonnenzimmer Pop Up Print Exhibition

Wednesday, Feb 1st, 7-10pm

Keep A Breast Loft
811 Traction Ave Loft 2A
LA CA 90013

Thanks to Keep A Breast and Boxed Water for the generous support!!

Back in 1991 in Blagnac, France, the H Street team came and did a demo. We all got really perplexed when we saw that Danny Way didn’t bring a vert board. Instead what he carried was one of these straight-railed, round-tailed, mini-wheeled (and no riser pads ! The heresy…) set-ups that hadn’t really reached France yet. “He just switched to street skating,” we thought, right before D.Way dropped on the monstrous vert ramp and killed it like nobody before –two tricks from that day even ended up in Questionable. Just one out of a million anecdotes testifying D.Way’s progression-oriented mind, as I’m pretty sure a certain documentary will soon assess better than my unsignificant 2-cents… For the rest, from H-Street to Plan B through Alien Workshop and Blind, Danny found a bit of time to discuss his own five favorite graphics. It’s all on Memory Screened.

I’m really stoked on the Allister Lee x ATLAS decks.  Each of the two decks in this artist series is signed and numbered in an edition of 50 and comes with an original piece of art, shrink-wrapped with each deck.  Get them at Atlas Skateboarding in San Mateo and check-out the fine installation that Allister and the Atlas crew setup in their shop. Up until March 12, 2012.  Mahalo to Allister and to Ryen, Mike and Nick at ATLAS! 

ATLAS SKATEBOARDING
209 2nd Ave.
San Mateo, CA 94401
Tel: 650.401.7110

Decks are also available at Equal Dist., where you’ll find Allister Lee’s infamous 500 Marker Poster as well as original artwork inspired by his love and expertise in the dark-arts.

Talk about a well-curated skateboard shop…!  Allister Lee also designed the ATLAS shop-decks shown below. 

The Quiet Life’s Facebook photo contest is down to the final six. Go to their Facebook page and vote for your favorite!

“We thought Solitary Arts and their 50mm 87A “Black Eggs” wheels were rad. So much so that we were inspired to create this clip and bridge the gap between 2 skate crews: Solitary Arts and Circle A.” Featuring Sean Connolly, Rich Hart and friends.

Ken Goto came through and snapped photos of both Geoff McFetridge (in LA) and myself for the Solitary Arts in issue 09 of SLIDER Magazine out of Japan.

The cover for this issue of SLIDER is the classic J.Grant Brittain photo-cover from Transworld (June 1987) of Tod Swank. Issue 09 features 6 luminaries in skateboarding photography and a photo retrospective of their works, along with a 20 page article on Tommy Guerrero, Ray Barbee, Matt Rodriguez, and Chuck Treece’s (BLKTOP Project) most recent tour of Japan, all shot by Goto.  You can order it through their site as it’s well worth it. Comes with a nice calendar too!

Below, Geoff McFetridge and Yong-Ki Chang, shot by Andrew Paynter. Thanks Andrew!

Fellow Mumbler, Don Pendleton did a series for Stereo that will be in shops soon. If you’re any sort of fan of Don or Stereo, you know how awesome these are. Nice one Don. Stereo’s full Spring ’12 catalog.

Share Your Beauty, a You Are Beautiful exhibition
January 14th – February 25th, 2012
Opening Reception: Wednesday, January 18, 2012, 6:30pm – 9:30pm
The Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts
2868 Mission Street, San Francisco CA 94110

Dreamland, an Exhibition of Artworks by Claudio Kirac.

‘Dreamland’ revolves around two key themes; the thrill of travel and the longing for home. While ‘on the road’ for periods at a time, and mostly without the leisure one would assume with travel or ‘holidays’, Claudio grasps the moments around him; wholly embracing local cultures and traditions, venturing ‘off the beaten path’ and stepping outside the comforts of everyday life. While befriending strangers and capturing those special moments one only encounters on ‘the journey’, work and play blur into one. Soon comes the challenge of missing the familiarity of home, the everyday norm, the common voices of close friends and the touch of a loved one. But it is this that makes us appreciate the everyday and helps restore our balance and soon we are home again where we can reflect on the journey and the places that became home for those moments in time. The works of ‘Dreamland’ express and investigate many of these notions.

Feb 23rd – March 6th 2012
Comb Space Gallery
Kirra Point, 23 McLean St, Coolangatta, Gold Coast, QLD, Australia.

Proudly hailing from Liverpool, no wonder Geoff Rowley’s career has been maculated with various winks at football culture -the most famous being of course his use of Gerry And The Pacemakers’ “You’ll Never Walk Alone” song in his Really Sorry part, which doubles as Liverpool Football Club’s anthem, duh. How did that one tune come into the picture? Geoff explains on A Visual Sound.

I had loosely suspected it before. It became really obvious when I started working on curating the board exhibit for that one show in Paris last summer: in 2011, there aren’t that many skateboard graphics that have something to say. I mean, by “newer” artists -which immediately sets asides the Templetons, Eli Gesners, Mike Hills, Todd Francises, Clivers, McKees and Aly Moores of Droorstalgic times past.
Not to tout the expired stale fart trumpet again, but my theme being called Agents Provocateurs -a journey through offensive/political board graphics- I sadly only had a couple names in mind when time came not to make this an all-90s board exhibit.
Thanks lil’ Baby Jesus though, there’s still a handful of artists who still carry the maculate torch today. Among the Siebens, the Winston Tsengs (enjoi) and the Whoever-thinks-of-these-sick-Skatementals-concepts, Ben Horton has remained one of my personal faves since he launched $LAVE Skateboards.  The brilliance of it all, the video, Ben Raybourn : the guy behind it had to be a Midas of sorts, I thought.  Well, he is. But he’ll never admit it. Enjoy his interview over at Memory Screened.

On the rare and condemned practice of trying to suckle on one’s own tail

Here’s some new drawings I’ve done, some of which are inspired by ouroboros, some by saxophone playing, and some by well . . . I think you can figure that part out. 

Again on the forbidden and shunned practice of suckling on one’s own tail

A scene in which a merman practice the forbidden and shunned practice of reverse suckling

Tomorrow night this opens in San Francisco. Last weekend I help art director, Porous Walker set up some of the installation and documented the progress. Photos can be seen over on my COLOR blog. More on Porous, the art department and the installation coming soon.

About the installation from the gallery:

FIFTY24SF Gallery, in association with Upper Playground and American Zoetrope, are pleased to announce TWIXT sc. 83, an exhibition and installation coinciding with legendary filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola’s newest feature film, Twixt. The exhibition opens January 13, 2012 with a public reception at 7PM.

Over his past three films, Francis Ford Coppola, famed director of The Godfather trilogy and Apocalypse Now, has set-out to create self-written, self-financed, self-produced, and self-distributed films with his own intimate crew. Developed through personal experiences, a love of American Gothic, Edgar Allan Poe, and Coppola’s own trials as a horror genre author, Twixt is the story of B-list author Hall Baltimore’s process of writing his new mystery while researching an old murder case in a remote Northern California town. While Baltimore (played by Val Kilmer) is seemingly rewriting history with the help of the an eccentric town sheriff, he finds himself embedded in his most personal, demanding story he has ever written. Filmed around Northern California with locals as actors, as well as sets built on Coppola’s own property in Rutherford, Twixt examines the process of storytelling as it applies to personal experience, artistic influences, and the classic American genres that have become staples of modern cinema.

Working within their own self-financed restraints and freedoms, the team behind Twixt had the unique experience of researching and building sets in and around Coppola’s home in Northern California. Many of the sets were built in Coppola’s backyard, while some required the small town backdrops of Northern Napa and Lake counties. In keeping with the original spirit of American horror, some scenes were created with intentional kitsch, while some dream sequence were shot with highly-detailed, ornate sets and original post-production work.

For TWIXT sc. 83, members of Twixt‘s tiny tiny Art Dept, (Jimmy DiMarcellis, David Hopp, and John Paul Goorjian) will be rebuilding the set of the film’s dramatic climax sequence, scene 83. The center of the gallery will feature a remake and stand-alone installation of the film’s clock tower, shown in the film as an impromptu 3D experience. Also on display from Twixt, will be bat and birdhouses from Nice, California artist John Hathaway, whose front yard/gallery/shop “The Woodpecker”, was a key set in the film. TWIXT sc. 83 will also feature a series of other pieces from the film’s set department that were found around different locations in Northern California and in the Coppola archives, as well as behind the scenes photography by the film’s executive producer, Anahid Nazarian and set photographer, Kalman Mueller. The gallery will run trailers of the film, along with other enhancements to bring Twixt‘s horror scenes to life.

John Freeborn has just released Random Zine #10, with a bit of a twist, this is the first time he’s releasing this zine as an iBook only.

Along with 19 other artists, he kindly asked me to participate in this issue. I submitted one piece, which I would call pretty random for me, it was fun! 100 pages with artwork by (in order of appearance) Hershel Baltrotsky, Sonia Yoon, Clint Woodside, Ryan Wallace, Rich Jacobs, Jim Houser, Kendrick Shackleford, Tom Maher, Ben Horton, Eric McDade, Chris Sembrot, Joseph Hart, Matt Sohl, Dave Delaney, Sam Croswell, Carlos Miaco, Matt Curtius, Amy S. Kauffman and Jordin Isip.

It’s only $.99 in the apple iBook store, click here to get it!

Here is a “Behind The Seams” video that I shot with my wife, Amber B. In it she walks you through the process of creating the stop-motion animation in the Eden video, piece by piece.

Amber and I co-directed the video, which tells the story of Element Eden. The project was a fun break from skate videos, and an opportunity to work together on something creative. I’m really looking forward to see where Amber takes her new found passion for animation and filmmaking.

To view the Eden video, click here. And for an in-depth article, click here.

Please check out my good friend Justin Visnesky’s wonderful print for sale on the Collect.give site. Collect.give is a place to collect contemporary photography and donate to worthy causes at the same time. 100% of the proceeds from Justin’s print will go to The Sprout Fund, a nonprofit organization supporting innovative ideas and grassroots community projects that are catalyzing change in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Sounds good to me!

Kirk and I spent our holidays road tripping down Highway – 1 through Big Sur. It was our third time and I am even more in love with that place after this trip. We saw Otters, Sea lions, Elephant Seals, Harbor Seals, California Condors and the Grey Whales migrating down to Mexico… It really is the Wild West.

Check out more photos from our trip over at amberbcreate.com

The Quiet Life is having a Facebook photo contest; upload two of your photos that you think would look fantastic on a tee shirt to their Facebook page and you’ll be entered into the contest. Winner get his photos on a Quiet Life shirt and $100 in QL gear. Enter now!

Joe Castro

This Saturday night in Philly is the opening for the Slingluff Gallery’s For Penn Treaty group show. Lots of great artists involved, including fellow Mumbler John Fellows, Jim Houser, Nosego, Shawn Beeks, Kevin Margitich, the Slingluff’s and more. Above is my contribution – a new painting entitled Iodine.

Anyway, the party’s from 6-9 pm with beverages provided by Art in the Age distillers and East Girard Gastropub. A portion from each sale will go toward helping maintain Penn Treaty Park in Philly, which is in need of a pretty serious face lift.  Should be a good time so don’t blow it – stop by if you’re in town.  11 W. Girard, Philadephia, PA.  You can also RSVP on facebook if that’s how you roll.

Jim Houser

NoseGo

]]> http://clubmumble.com/2012/01/05/for-penn-treaty/feed/ 0 http://clubmumble.com/2012/01/04/the-first-annual-supersonic-electronic-invitational-1-5-12/ http://clubmumble.com/2012/01/04/the-first-annual-supersonic-electronic-invitational-1-5-12/#comments Thu, 05 Jan 2012 00:38:22 +0000 Michael Hsiung http://clubmumble.com/?p=21042

I’ll be participating in my first group show of 2012!  At the First Annual Supersonic Electronic Invitational at Spoke Art in San Francisco. The show features a great line up and opens Thursday, January 5th. 

When it comes to documenting Australian skateboarding in moving pictures, Chris Middlebrook is the most well known and no doubt one of the most devoted. Two of his most recent accomplishments include Nike SB Chronicles #1 and what is arguably the video part of the year: Nick Boserio’s Life Splicing part.

Aside from VX and HD Midds is also a bit of a Super 8 lord. Over at the SbA site we have recently unearthed Chris Middlebrook’s Super 8 reel from 2008. Inside you will find archival footage of: Shane O’Neill, Andrew Brophy Dane Burman, Lewis Marnell, Andrew Currie, Bryce Golder, Nick Boserio, Alex Campbell, Justin Brock, Tommy Fynn and a myriad of other talented rolling units.

Chris Middlebrook is currently working on a part for the next Transworld Video “The Cinematographer Project”: be prepared for some locally spawned lunacy in that one.

Merry Merry Season peoples. See you next year.

The concept to the Filmbot ReGrip’s are that with soo much skateboard media coming out, a quality video part could have gone unnoticed by the skateboard community. What we do is remix the part, possible add some tricks and hopefully catch some eyes who hadn’t seen it before, plus just have some fun.
To watch more Filmbot Re-Grips click here!

The Quiet Life has updated their holiday deal. Don’t delay.

John Fellows x 303 Board Graphic

I noticed that 303 Boards (http://303boards.com/) here in Denver released the graphic I made just in time for the Holidays. Printed in a limited edition right here in the good ol’ USA! I wanted to try and create something totally different from what I was seeing out in the shops and also use the whole board as a canvas and not just between the trucks. I know I’m guilty of slacking off here and there (especially this time of year) so “Work Hard” and “Stay True” are some good words to live by. If you swing over to 303, make sure to check out the other artist collaboration boards they have. There are definitely some good ones.

Daniel Rolnik recently did a little interview with me that is now on the Hi Fructose site.  Thanks!

Like parks and recreation and helping out a good cause? If you answered “yes”, then you should check out Philadelphia based Slingluff Gallery’s (http://www.SlingluffGallery.com/) open call. They are putting on a fundraiser art show to help benefit Penn Treaty Park. In their own words “The park is down the street from the gallery, it’s a great little park on a river that hosts a ton of music, art, and other events through out the year so it feels good to be able to give them something back.” This isn’t your normal “art donation” benefit either. They want to make sure everyone involved gets something out of this.

The opening is going to be sponsored by Art In The Age (http://www.artintheage.com/) who will be providing Root and Snap for your drinking pleasure, granted that you are of drinking age. The opening will be on the first Saturday of January which is on the 7th and will run from 6-9p and the show will be hung till January 29th.

For more info and any questions regarding this group show please feel free to email them at: theslingluffgallery@gmail.com

I posted up some of the leftover pieces (as well as some collaborations with Mark Penxa) for sale that were created for The Worst is Yet to Come exhibit that opened in Rochester, NY in Sept. 2010. This is officially the Rest of the Worst is Yet to Come. Check out the available pieces here.

TOP 8 from THE ISLAND

1ST: Chima Ferguson ($4000)

2ND: Tommy Fynn ($2500)

3RD: Jack Fardell ($1500)

4TH: Jack Kirk ($800)

5TH: Jake Duncombe ($500)

6TH: Reece Warren ($300)

7TH: Alex Campbell ($200)

8TH: Joel McIlroy ($200)

ISLAND WRAP

Cockatoo Island is not only the largest isle in Sydney Harbour; it has one of the most colourful histories. Prior to being home to the first ever SbA Pro/Am Grand Final it was an imperial prison, an industrial school, a reformatory, a jail and was the site of one of Australia’s largest boat building docks. Cockatoo is also closely aligned with the legend of bushranger Captain Thunderbolt, who was one of two prisoners to ever escape the island. Their escape was aided by Thunder’s lover Mary Ann Bugg who swam through the harbours shark-infested waters to save them. Thunderbolt was given his name whilst on the job: during one of his robberies he knocked on a door as a clap of thunder and lightening ignited the skies. The victim asked who was at the door to which he replied: “Thunderbolt”. Of course prior to the intervention of colonialism Cockatoo was no doubt a sacred stomping ground for indigenous tribes and possibly the odd cockatoo.

During event lead up there were several trips out to the island. My first trip was with Cuzz and we were in charge of surface checks on the heritage-listed ground. After a serious run in with an egg-guarding screech-burger of a sea gull, and several heated discussions regarding the logistical problems of holding a comp on the island, we thought we would calm our nerves with a beverage. Whilst ordering the edge was taking off by a gruff but jovial chinless wonder of a Hungarian tuck-shop manager. He was the kind of odd character you would find in an old Bond film. His vibe somehow smoothed the situation and mid bev we ran back over to the site and finally sussed how the course could work.

Over the months of prep that followed it was no doubt that Logistics Manager Steve Murphy went through the most trials and tribulations. At one point he was heard ordering some fluorescent inflatable tower lights over the phone: “So how big are they mate?“… (pause)… “Oh so about as big as a fat person?” The attention to detail was phenomenal. So how do you get a skate course built on an island you ask? Every element had to come by barge: 24 of them! The course design and construction was a combination of efforts between SbA, Convic and Shane Serena’s Revolution crews. The course housed elements such as the bank to ledge to bank, the out rail (based on Perth’s swing out bar), the doorstop slappy kickers, the wheel chair ramp and the Sydney Harbour Bridge China Bank. (article continued with video over on the sba site)

(link straight to video)

Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty stoked that winter is in full swing and all the resorts are open here in Colorado so I felt it was time to finish up some new snow related prints. The first one titled “The End of a Good Day” is celebrating the end of a great bluebird powder day but the start of a fun night ($25 / edition of 30). It was originally created for the Denver stop of the ArtCrank poster show (www.artcrank.com). The second is an homage to the beauty of old school machinery…. a “1972 Tucker Sno-cat” that’s been sitting on my in-laws property for a while now ($20 / edition of 40). Would be sweet to get that thing running again…

Both originally started out as linoleum carvings. Feel free to contact me for more info: john@johnfellows.net

“1972 Tucker Sno-cat” – 2-color screen print on heavyweight bright white stock / 18″x12″

Speakeasy in Long Beach this weekend is gonna be awesome! Curated by the talented Christina Platis and featuring art works by Jerimy Lumia, Jayson Diebel, Angela Medina and Christina Platis.

FRIDAY
10:30 Highlands
9:30 N O W (dance disaster movement, 60 watt kid)
with Psychedelic Partners

SATURDAY
10:30 Bad Dreams
9:30 The Wildbunch
with Psychedelic Partners

Speakeasy – 1679 w. 9th st, Long Beach, CA 90813

I just saw a copy of this book published in conjunction with Three Sixty Project’s first annual skateboard deck exhibition in
Australia recently. The exhibition and book are raising funds for skate programs working with under-priveleged youth all
over the world and some photos I’ve taken while working with Skateistan Cambodia feature throughout.

The photos were all taken at Skateistan skate sessions in Phnom Penh, Cambodia and were used with permission from
Friends Int. Mith Samlanh centre and Pour un Sourire d’ Enfant (PSE)

For more information or to support the One X One X One project or Skateistan head to the links above.

We just built a photo studio in our garage and this is the first shoot to go down.

Featured – fellow Mumbler Mr. Adam Hoyle.

Buy a bunch of clothes and get a bag to put them all in from The Quiet Life. $100 spent in their store gets you a $40 duffel, nice one.

Elemental Awareness hit the road to visit their friends on the Apache, Flathead, and Navajo reservations, where they were able to skate with the kids, and connect on a larger level…

Through the CHANGING LIVES THROUGH SKATEBOARDING program, they were able to give away more than 100 pairs of shoes, 50 skateboards and tons of other product. Needless to say, the kids were hyped and received some much needed gear.

Click here to see some photos from the tour. And for more information on Elemental Awareness and their programs, visit their site and Facebook page.

I visited San Francisco during October and had the sickest time, the weather was mostly rad for my whole stay. This is just half the footage that I filmed with friends there including team skater Albert Gesswein. Cheers for the good times and rad memories everyone.

Bro’s: Tom Brinkerhoff, Albert Gesswein, Josh Zonker, Courtland Donaldson, Waka, Dustin Walls, Josh Robertson, Scotty Mcdade, Kai Gormsen, Faris Hassen, and myself.

http://www.scienceskateboards.co.uk
http://www.thelivingroomfloor.com
http://www.dlxsf.com/store

www.nonstndrd.com

Yarrr Woods Flyer

Tomorrow in Melbourne (Australia) there is an artshow/bar opening in Chapel St.

Yarrr! is an annual art show put on by my friend Micah. Apart from having original art work on display, he also prints the images onto Tshirts which will be for sale at the opening.

The Woods is a new restaurant which is being opened the guys who own The Yellow Bird, Melbourne’s favourite bar for skateboarders to be idiots at.

Hoon Skateboards Fast Drinks Series

Hoon Skateboards sponsor all my favourite Australian skaters so I was pretty stoked that they asked me draw another series of board graphics for them. There’s no bro model this time, just these two for Dorfus and Cuzza.
Check their other stuff out at hoonskate.com … there’s some rad videos on there.

Last May California announced plans to close one quarter of their 278 parks, a devastating move that is intended to save the state a mere $22 million per year. The closure list includes thousands of acres of park land, recreation areas, wildlife reserves, and 50% of the State’s historical parks. By July 2012 Californians will be bereft of 70 magnificent natural parks.

The First 70 is a short film about Californians banding together to enact change and develop solutions in the face of a glaring bureaucratic oversight. Money raised via Kickstarter will help Lauren Valentino, Jarratt Moody and Corey Brown finish the documentary about the National Parks to help bring awareness.

Visit heathhenfilms.com to find out more and donate. Every little bit counts and we only have 29 days left to pledge.

Join their Facebook and Twitter.