Bio/Background
I am a 24 Year old Music Producer/Audio Engineer/Field Recordist based in the South West of England, Torquay. With a deep passion for Music, Sonic ecology and Skateboarding I felt it would be in my best interest to explore these avenues, aswell as previously recognising many parallels and interesting details within skateboarding and music. With more focus on soundtracks to skate-parks, and new fancy sets and cameras to record skate parts I believed less acknowledgement and representation to raw skate sounds was being compounded more and more. Realising that audio and sounds within skateboarding are often overlooked to their visual counterparts, I believed it would be fitting and beneficial to the world of skateboarding to put a spotlight on the sonic universe of the Art form. That innovation could be driven through the sonic means of skateboarding as opposed to just its graphical elements, and that new techniques and representation of skateboard audio can be developed.
Contact –
@topologyofskateboarding – Instagram
@judexanderjaremi@gmail.com – Email
Some General thoughts.
Whether cost reductive or sheer negligence in design, the majority of South West skateparks have no cover proving to be useless facilities when raining or bad weather in seasons that aren’t summer (still rainy at best) – alienating a demographic of people who don’t have the financial means; commuting (to and from an indoor skatepark), paying for entry to said facility, paying for food and drink, paying for equipment etc etc. for a culture/sport aimed/geared towards the youth, which now has Olympic and governmental ties; the sheer negligence of governments, councils and companies is detrimental to the socio economic problems we see today within skateboarding, ranging from the young children to young adults. A culture rooted within a sense of DIY, anarchism and anti-establishment, its interesting to see how as more funding gets pumped into skateboarding, and more “shiny” skateparks developed, the realistic problems and factors aren’t actually addressed. It’s interesting how countries like Japan can develop the future of skateboarding with resources and infrastructure, whilst maintaining a strict anti-skating policy in cities and state property, specifically in Tokyo.
Though one shouldn’t complain, the sheer amount of new skateparks being developed across the southwest region is astounding and is great for the development of the youth and sport, but at times the veneer and shellac wears off and the true honest pitfalls are left to be observed, to almost indict a sense of surface level intention with each one
With the majority of skateparks centrifugal identity being the local surroundings and taking inspiration from such surrounding, the idea that the spaces would be (consistently) usable within specific seasons and not all seasons is ironic. It lends to ideas of self-sabotage, of councils trying to remove skatepark facilities due to being ‘unsafe’ though it is often the councils’ negligence which makes the facilities unsafe (specifically victoria park in paignton as a reference point). The idea that something doesn’t have to be developed or funded due to one existing in the past and failing, with lack of use lack of upkeep to enforce the idea that skateboarding and skateparks are bad across counties.
A forced redundancy which ensures the council won’t have to waste money and resources on the sport due to failed endeavours in the past. Land being used for a skatepark/leisure activity, to then be defunct from lack of resources to then be reduced to a plot of land to develop housing, hotels and such.
The Yin and Yang of cultural development within skateboarding as a sport and as an art, though it is progressing and developing in areas to be more accessible via skateparks and designated skateboard areas, other locales suffer with the lack of infrastructure and location to skate, specifically dependent on weather, financial stability, and the radial areas attitudes toward the endeavour.