artdeckco skateboards

When recruited by Michael Haight and Jason Schwall to be part of ArtDeckCo's Artists on Board in the winter of 2014, we thought it was a scam. There's no way an event like this could ever exist. Well, we were wrong.

ArtDeckCo’s Artists on Board was the world’s largest traveling skateboard exhibition that traveled all over the United States. I believe at last count, they were showing over 500 boards at a time from independent artist from all over the world. We were recruited to participate in the second show in Chicago, IL in 2014 and we actually sold our first prototype named “Lustitia.” After that we followed up with another and well our love for doing skateboards just snowballed.

Unfortunately, ArtDeckCo has since faded away but the tremendous footprint they left upon the skateboard community, independent art, and design industry remains.

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Additional Credits: Painter: Brian Roach, Visual Consultant: Nicolet Webber 

Lustitia questions the absence of accountability in investment & commercial banking activities since the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act. Those of us who lived through the Financial Crisis of 2008 will remember how uncertain everything was. Coming out of graduate school and going into a near non-existent the job market was terrifying. Like most political, social, and economical catastrophes throughout history, no one was held accountable and we are waiting for the next banking collapse.

The Glass-Steagall Act prevented commercial banks from speculative risk-taking which leads to financial crises. Now ask yourself, how prepared are you for the financial crisis? Exactly. We, the people, want justice and accountability now.

After we sold our first skateboard at ArtDeckCo’s Artists on Board in Chicago, we were invited to do a new skateboard design. As always, it’s a struggle whenever we’re given a blank canvas to be creative. What to say? What message do we want to bring awareness to? What’s the end goal? What aesthetics should we use? But not this time. We chose something more fun. Something cathartic.

“Jeffrey, what’s going on here?” is a mashup of two of our favorite artists that have influenced us over and over again. Laura Dern’s powerful yet hilarious cry face in David Lynch’s classic Blue Velvet has perplexed us for years. Replacing Marilyn Monroe’s image in Andy Warhol’s Marilyns with Laura Dern’s image seemed like a natural fit. So with the help of a few laser cut stencils and a lot of spray paint we created one hell of skateboard.

The laser cut stencil, spray paint, and contoured shape of the board created an inevitable feel of chaos. The imperfections left behind by the spray paint going through a tiny hole which could change depending upon any kind of airflow really became a textural element. From far away everything looks rather clean and sleek but upon examining the imperfections, they act like a fingerprint to give the piece added depth and detail hidden away from the brief glance.

After completing our original concept, we had to follow it up with our take on Warhol’s “Gold Marilyn Monroe.” We decided to call it “Gold Velvet” for obvious reasons.