Surfing
Surfing
Introducing a New Surf Series, “In Plain Sight”
Go beyond the lineup to find the best characters and stories shaped by surfing
A lone person riding a wave is an inconsequential activity. A harmonic and communal interaction with nature and an intimate experience for the individual, yes. But selfish and likely useless to the world at large is probably a more accurate assessment of our beloved activity’s impact on the grand scale of life. Preeminent surfing historian and academic Matt Warshaw once put it like this, “Surfing, alone among sports, generates laughter at its very suggestion, and this is because it turns not a skill into an art, but an inexplicable and useless urge into a vital way of life.”
The Golden Gate Bridge, In Plain Sight
© David Dominguez
In our new surf series “In Plain Sight,” we worked with directors and creatives to take a closer look at the world of wave riding and what happens below the surface of it all. What we discovered is a rich and diverse tapestry of people who love riding waves, and how their experiences have added significant depth to their lives not only as surfers, but as humans beings.
We went into unlikely surf communities. We spent time with the misunderstood. We addressed tough topics and potential historical inaccuracies. We probed the minds of some of surfing’s most guarded stars. And we discovered a rapidly evolving culture full of characters, nuance and diversity.
To kick the series off, we questioned the very root of surfing’s origin and its subsequent cultural evolution into what we recognize today. People of color have had a bigger impact on surfing culture than we’ve been told, and it was accomplished against difficult odds. In "Race & Surfing: A Brief History," filmmaker Jeremy Asher Lynch and director and illustrator Claire Pinegar trace and tell one of surfing’s many origin stories with Selema Masekela. The piece highlights key figures, from ancient Polynesians to Californian Nick Galbadon, an African American man who regularly paddled 12 miles from Santa Monica to Malibu to surf the famous waves of First Point, which were off limits to him in the 1940s.
Race & Surfing, A Brief History
© Claire Pinegar
Subjects: Kolohe Andino
© Jacob Vanderwork
Subjects: Kolohe Andino
© Blake Myers
In “The Surfing Magician,” we go to Santa Cruz, California to meet up with Zoltan Torkos, a surfing magician who is still the only person to ever successfully pull off and record a kickflip on a wave in the ocean. Over the last decade Zoltan’s kickflip became parking lot folklore — the full story never really coming into proper focus. In meeting Zoltan, we discovered someone who had been through and overcome extremely difficult times in his life, but found extra motivation when the tragic passing of his best friend Carl Reimer pushed him to find a renewed sense of self thanks to surfing.
In “Subjects: Kolohe Andino,” we convinced Kolohe Andino to come to an undisclosed location in Southern California to shoot an interview. When he arrived, he said, “I don’t even know why I’m here and I feel like I’m being tricked.” Not exactly, but our strategy paid off in one of the most earnest and revealing interviews with Kolohe to date.
Then we head to San Francisco for "City Surf," where Johnny Irwin and his City Surf Project have spent the last decade introducing surfing to a wide variety of kids from all over the Bay Area. Most of the students have never been in the ocean, despite the fact that within San Francisco city limits you’re never more than 7 miles from the beach. City Surf aims not only to change that, but also to inspire kids enough to become lifelong surfers.
City Surf
© David Dominguez
Zoltan Torkos, the Surfing Magician
© Jeremy Asher Lynch
Hayden Rodgers in Surfing’s Headache
© Jamie Heinrich
In “Surfing’s Headache,” we sit down with Hayden Rodgers, a young surfer who suffered head trauma while surfing at Pipeline. Dr. Tim Brown breaks down the latest brain injury treatments and explains why the surf world is only now beginning to understand the long-term effects that come with chasing waves your whole life.
“In Plain Sight" is proof positive that surfing is more than just a useless thing, but rather an act of fearlessness that can impact us in truly extraordinary ways. This series reminds us that surfing saves, inspires, motivates, educates and repairs, if you look just beneath the surface of the waves.
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