Street Culture: Ed Templeton

An icon of street culture, Ed Templeton is both a skateboarding legend and a prolific artist. His photographs, paintings, and collaborations with his wife, Deanna, capture the gritty, autodidactic aesthetic of the skateboarding lifestyle. Templeton is still a professional skater, landing pro sponsorships and running his Toy Machine skateboard company, but he also was a star of the traveling Beautiful Losers exhibition and is one of the founding editors of ANP Quarterly. Artkrush contributor Carlo McCormick talks with Templeton about his fusion of skateboarding and art.
AK: What do you find different, as well as similar, about art and skateboarding?

ET: There's some common ground between skateboarding and art, though skating is a lot different in 2007 than when I started out in 1985. Then, skaters were very much an alienated group — the kind of kids who weren't into team sports and weren't particularly liked around school. It was much more about individuals: punkers drawing their own fliers, making tapes, and putting out zines. As that scene evolved, people got into photography and putting out magazines, but it was all very natural and organic, with a much cleaner and clearer connection between skate and art. Now, with big business and stuff like the X Games, there's more of a jock element, so it's gone from something that you'd get your ass kicked for doing to BMOC status. But what I think skating has in common with art is that it's an unjustifiable recreation. Many people can be good at it, but that part is really up to interpretation — which seems a lot like art.

AK: Skateboarding, particularly as it became more urban, has changed the way people relate to their surroundings. Most of us try to get from point A to point B as quickly as possible; do you think the active navigation of skating encourages a different kind of engagement?

ET: Mark Gonzales is a great example of that. Just watching him walk down the street, you can tell he sees the world differently from anyone else. Even when I'm walking, I still see stuff as potential skate obstacles. Skating does transform you as a person from just existing in the world to being much more aware of your environment.

AK: Many of your efforts have been DIY: you started your own skateboard company, Toy Machine, rather than riding for a bigger name, you made your own art zines before working with publishers, and your paintings are very much self-taught. How do you maneuver the forces of the art market and the pro-sports world as an idealistic independent?

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