austin skate notes

It was a kick in the gut to read that Gallery Lombardi is going to shut its doors in January. With the current economic recession, I might as well copy this text to my clipboard to paste into a long series of ASN blurbs about local businesses closing. For those unfamiliar, Gallery Lombardi is an excellent local gallery that has featured dozens of local skateboarders’ art in thoughtful exhibits. People like Andy Rihn, Michael P, Lee Brooks, and Michael Sieben are obvious examples that come to mind. Curator, Rachel Koeper was one of he panelists who selected the artist to create the public art for the upcoming skatepark in House Park.

Speaking of Chris Levack, during the recent East Austin Studio Tour, he displayed some drawings and scale models of the work he’s putting together for the House Park skatepark.

Leander is hosting its second public input meeting on its upcoming public skatepark next wednesday at 7:00 PM. There will be three conceptual designs presented at the meeting for attendees to discuss and vote on. Here’s a flyer for the meeting with location, date, and time.

After the meeting on Wednesday, a movie will open at select theaters starring Mickey Rourke and an academy award-winning actress. It’s called, “The Wrestler,” and also features a theme song crafted by Bruce Springsteen. Oh, and comedian, Todd Barry.

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In the past five or more years, San Antonio’s skate scene has enjoyed two really great skate spots that attracted skate nomads from around the world. Shallow Hal and the Claw Ramp no longer exist. The improbably small pool that was improved upon by Fields Hammond to great effect was recently filled in with dirt. Like every plywood skate behemoth eventually suffers, the Claw Ramp was dismantled in October. Check out the footage of Indy Pros skating these spots during their final sessions on the 30th Anniversary Indy Tour video.

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Shawn Rylander, Editor & Publisher of Disposable Camera zine, lost all of his belongings earlier this week when a fire gutted the house he was renting with Bryan Rogers. It’s assumed that Bryan also lost all of his stuff in the fire. Nobody was injured in the blaze that took place while nobody was home. Apparently someone visited the couch on their front porch while they were gone and left a cigarette burning on the piece of furniture, which then caught the rest of the house on fire.

Bryan is currently out of town, but Shawn has been given temporary housing by Chris Summers. Both of these guys could probably use some help recovering from this tragedy.

A photo of Chris Smith grinding @ Patterson is in competition for the ‘best photo of the day’ on the Statesman website. It’s #11 in the series of photos embedded in that flash presentation.

Jason Schmale has taken in a homeless cat that just gave birth to some kittens. He’s looking to adopt them out to good homes. Check out the cuteness.

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Michael Sieben’s print, ‘Hang Five‘ can be seen in the R-comedy, “Role Models.” There were some laughs in addition to the fine art in that movie, but I had a better time watching ex-Madonna husband, Guy Ritchie’s, “Rocknrolla” this weekend. It’s a welcome return to gangsters and razor-sharp dialogue.

Independent has some more footage posted online from their 30th Anniversary Tour.

Working people lost an advocate two weeks ago when Studs Terkel passed away at the age of 96. Meanwhile, the Austin Museum of Art is hosting an exhibit containing some of Sebastião Salgado worker photos.

Leander skateboarders will want to attend the public input meeting to be held on Nov. 22nd. It’s the first meeting in the design process of that city’s first public skatepark.
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This past weekend was busy for Austin’s skateboarding ghouls. On Saturday evening, longtime Austin skateboarder, John Weiss, married Jessie. Many of Austin’s skate luminaries were in attendance including Andy Rihn, Adam Young, Kevin Trayhan, Michael Sieben, Sandy Carson, and Joe Rich. Well-wishers enjoyed a photo booth, vegetarian food, and a stack of donuts that would have burst all the buttons on Homer’s pants.

Last month’s issue (October 2008) of the skateboard mag featured my photos from the Houston Public Skatepark grand opening. Thrasher’s current cover is emblazoned with a great photo of Christian Hosoi’s backside ollie-tail grab that’s similar to my photo, but to clarify, that photographer was about two feet to my left. It’s not my photo. Speaking of Independent’s 30th Anniversary, this trailer showcases some Independent legends skating in San Antonio.

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The SPoSM (Skatepark of San Marcos) group is gearing up for two events in south central next month. The fifth annual Broderick Memorial Contest will be held on November 15th at the San Marcos skatepark. Street and best trick competitions on that day will be followed by a ditch contest at CFAN the following day. Maybe Aaron will post some more details on the SPoSM site as they become available.

As I’ve been travelling around the country, big-time scene builders, Nathan Black and Jared Ficklin have picked up the Patterson Park revegetation responsibilities and achieved stunning results. This has required multiple visits every day to manage water sprinklers, repair broken hoses, replace stolen timers, and clean up remaining building materials. This amount of time and effort has been invested to give the grass the best chance possible of survival so the spot doesn’t turn into a dust pile like Mabel Davis. There will be some ongoing issues to address, such as keeping BMXers from doing airs off the sides of the ramp onto the grass berm, and hopefully visitors of the ramp will become good stewards of the skate spot so we can maintain a positive scene there and create more in other parks throughout Austin.

So when will the miniramp be open? Well, Jared has been working with Austin PARD to have them inspect and sign-off on the project, which will hopefully happen in the coming week. In the meantime, you can early-vote.

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