the map overlays the one you know, unless you, too, are a skater.
then, it's just the same as the map you know. the one with banks to, you know, SMACK your deck on. the best places to wiggle your little tush all over the place.
the collective map of the skateboarding community is dense. thick as thieves. thieves with a lot of love and a cohesive ethical code.
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CHINATOWN, NY >
Marcus Eagle has a story from New York Fashion Week, September 2019, where this guy, a rando, pops up at the park. Everyone was sitting around eating cookout food around him and his friends as they skated. Chill park vibes.
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He, the rando fashion man, wanted to just capture some video of himself with skaters behind him.
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For his ... whatever. YouTube, Insta...
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It doesn't matter why, really. Not for this article on Marcus Eagle. (but, god, the path of attempting to figure out that WHY certainly promises to be a mentally simulating, Fresh Prince wonderland of confusing and layered 90s signaling, bing bong wacko nonsense.)
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So, this person asked Marcus and his friends to actually BE AWARE of this as it was happening. To play along even. To allow him to frame things up with them in mind. Without planning this ahead of time with them. No pay was discussed, notably (this publication has a clear mission of promoting the exchange of money for services rendered).
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So Marcus and his friends did what everyone in the park probably wanted to do:
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called the man out as a FRAUD.
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One dude walked with his ass out in the back of the video, and they made sure he knew that he was taking something away from their community with the intrusion and presumption.
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The man offered them and every table filled with people at the park a beer. In return, every table full of people at the park and every skater declined to accept the beer.
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The video had about 1.6 million views by the time Marcus showed it to me. I won't be linking to it. Please don't ask Marcus about the link either.
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He, the rando, wanted in.
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So do I! Who could blame the man. Marcus can. And he has the right to. It's his community. And like any, there's a human right and a human need to be protective of that community.
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There's a reason people wear Supreme and society posits the reason for it is to feel BONDED by a symbol. To be part of it. Who could BLAME THEM. Is there a person among us who doesn't want to be part of some it or some other it.
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There's a reason skaters don't wear Supreme.
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Skaters, not posers, tend to dislike a company like SUPREME practicing the fine art of co-opting, or appropriating. It turns out communities of people are not keen on someone making money off of the way they've expressed themselves externally, internally.
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It's not just about hurt feelings. It's about MONEY. The people need MONEY. SO at the very least, they're gonna make fun of the freshprince of fashion and let him know that it's not that cool what he's doing...
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So there's symbols. Sometimes the symbol is a flip on the original. That's the nuanced communicative nature of fashion. Expression can be entirely understood as a meme of itself and that can be entirely on purpose.
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Like if Hester Prynne got together the rest of the women and they just all decided to wear their A as a symbol of pride and feminism. Like Regina George wearing her tank top void of nipple-area-coverage. Like the gays wear glitter. Why we wear what we wear is an exhausted topic. But the point remains:
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skaters
have
their
own thing goin on.
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Marcus started learning the skater things when he was something close to 13 years old. He and his friends would take the train down from up the MetroNorth to Manhattan and hide in the bathroom with all 6 of them so they could avoid the fare to Grand Central.
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lol.
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Now he lives in Brooklyn and works in Chinatown. He skates in both. and everywhere else. There's not a limit to the bounds of the skater map.
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It's everywhere we all walk. But he sees it, as clearly as if there were a different transparency on the map he travels. And, respectfully, he defends his community as one of the best, partly due to that quality. The EVERYWHERE quality.
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Most inclusive.
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Most authentic.
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Most community.
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Tradition.
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LIKE A FIDDLER. ON THE ROOF!
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"Growing up, you're watching skate videos. Professional skate videos. You see a lot of New York City. You see a lot of California and stuff too but that's, like, not...
that obtainable when you're that young. So, like,
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New York City, for anybody, not just a skater, is such an epic fucking place, but as a skateboarder it's even more epic, I think.
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Uh.
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Just given the freedom, you can skate everywhere. There are spots everywhere. My hometown is pretty boring, pretty unaccepting of spots, it's too quiet.
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Here it's so loud, it's so appropriate. Cuz like, the city is so loud and crazy and that's how we want to be, I think."
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"But that's not even the main reason why. The main reason is the spots.
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The architecture. The mass skate community was always mesmerizing. Everybody... especially now, everybody is skating... it's incredible."
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Skating has taken him to Hamburg. Austria. The U.S., from NY to California.
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"I'm hugely grateful for that.
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If i didn't skate I wouldn't' have seen these places.
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I wouldn't even live in the City if I didn't skate.
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It makes me appreciate New York in way other ways. From an artist perspective. The food world. so many ... it's opened my eyes to so much other shit New York has to offer but
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if I didn't skate I would live on... fuckin... a farm somewhere.
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"One of the first times I came to the city was for something called Back to the Banks and ...
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under the Brooklyn Bridge on the Manhattan side, the Brooklyn Banks, which is not skateable anymore.
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But they would have this competition every year and. The BEST dudes would go to that. So many pros. And that was the first time I've ever seen pros, not only seen pros but watch them skate as well. So like The Baker and The America Team...
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I got to watch Andrew Reynolds and Kevin 'Spanky Long.' "
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The shoes
the comfort
the energy drink sponsorships
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"I also discovered this graffiti artist Neckface - everybody in skateboarding knows him.
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First hearing about Neckface and seeing his fucked up paintings and fucked up graphics and tags and colabs with he board companies I became like... a huge fan of his art. It was dark. It was cool."
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"And growing up in a suburban neighborhood - being jaded and not aware. I didn't have a computer."
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"A whole world opens up. This massive, massive world."
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"and I wasn't into art at the time. I just wanted to watch and skate and meet people. But seeing Neckface's graffiti ... wow, that shit is sick. I think I like art now too. It hit me.
I didn't search for that."
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The fashion and art worlds are so linked, but skaters are focused on skating.
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Not trying to collaborate. That's just a cool byproduct.
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Skating requires doing the work.
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Being a part of the community is a no-bullshit process: just do the work.
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Marcus knows what I'm talking about when I talk about the LOOK of skateboarding.
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"If looking like the coolest, if you want to leave the house and look really cool but it's not comfortable you're not going to do it. You're going to meet somewhere in the middle..."
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Function over form.
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"...and that's my little issue when people are taking the look of skateboarding. We're not dressing like this for a look. We're dressing like this for a purpose."
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"The shoelace belt served a purpose."
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And, he mentioned, you can pack your joint with the end of it. Dual purpose.
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He said the skating community appreciates designated spots for skating.
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"You don't have to worry about being kicked out."
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"But skateboarders love the streets. It's an enormous part of the culture to skate the streets.
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Finding things not built for skating but skating on them..."
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Skateparks are for meeting up and warming up. Practice.
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"But a big play in skateboarding is taking it to the streets. You'd just adventure. It's constantly taking you on the rollercoaster."
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The rollercoaster is a twisted track with destinations all across a global network of couches to stay on.
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"And skateboarders actually do that. Skateboarding is the most welcoming community that I've ever been a part of."
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There's a reliance on authenticity, like in most communities. But, you can't fake being a skateboarder. You have to do the work.
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"there's no hiding in skateboarding
the reality is going to come out
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if you're riding a skateboard, you're exposed."
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So....
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"Don't do a fashion shoot at a skate park."
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Unless?
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"Unless it supports the skateboarding."
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"I think every skater...
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Skateboarding has like
shaped them into who they are
how they speak
who they talk to
how they talk to people
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and skateboarding has like
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given me i guess like CONFIDENCE to talk to anybody.
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the community of skateboarding benefits skateboarders so much and
failure within skateboarding benefits skateboarders so much
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like constantly falling, constantly failing, constantly eating shit, getting hurt, bleeding, cleaning it up and trying it again, i compare that to going to a job interview
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oh, they denied you
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i don't give a shit
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i'll try that same job again. i'll try a different job.
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some people get a taste of failure and run away from it, meanwhile skateboarders are used to constant failure."
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marcus eagle is a New York based skateboarder. This interview took place near The China Banks, as skaters might (do) know it. contribute to the skating community on our upvting page.
back to jan. 2020 - breakfast
do you or don't you have a relationship with your social media account where you feel like unfollowing people is directly affecting your life? this is not an article just a question.
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in the future, i'm fine with just wearing plastic shoes made of the scraps we pluck from the throats of the turtles and promote only the designers that are hiring people for the same rate that i expect as a fellow human being. and i guess i'll have to shop the sales so the companies lose out on profits
