I have had a life long relationship with skateboarding and skateboarders. Every single boyfriend and ex husband I’ve ever had has been a skateboarder. It is how I really learned to photograph. As a teenager when all of my friends were riding, I was photographing. It taught me to have a dialogue with my subject, to look at space differently, to understand the architecture of cities through a different lens and the interpersonal communication of movement through those spaces. It taught me how to frame an image, how to be ready and present and paying attention always, how to have a complete dedication to your craft, to do something over and over and over until it is right, to just fall and get back up. It taught me subculture and then absorbed me into it, made me drawn always to the things that are the opposite of main stream. It shaped my understanding of creative practice, which was then further articulated during art school and even further through age and moving through life experiences. So, this morning, as I am mulling over some big questions and decisions and trying to re-articulate my own path, feeling exhausted by this current moment, I opened up Instagram to this image by one of my long time favorites Ed Templeton - I rarely repost anyone else’s images but, this is completely suited to this Sunday morning. Hope it does something for you, too.
I’m off to the studio for the day, stitching up bags, keeping things running, making things happen.
xoxo,
Wendy