Scary Skull

Last week I took a trip to Domy Books (in Austin), and while I was there I picked up a copy of WARNING: The Art of Marc Mckee. If you're not familiar with Marc Mckee, then I'm going to take a shot in the dark and guess that you're not an aging male skateboarder in your 30s. Am I right? Marc Mckee and Sean Cliver are (in my opinion) the two most important skateboard graphic designers/illustrators of the early 90s. This book gives a nice overview of Marc's graphic work from the late 80s to present day.

This is my favorite skateboard graphic of all time. And it's my favorite for many reasons beyond the actual graphic. When I see this board it conjures up so many awesome memories of skating during this time period (the board came out in 1989.) The aesthetic was also a radical shift from the standard-issue scary skull imagery that was so prevalent in skateboard graphic design throughout the 80s. The tide was about to turn.

It's also important to note that Mike Vallely was one of the coolest/most popular skateboarders on Earth when the Barnyard graphic came out. It's easy to forget that if you've followed his hockey/wrestling/poetry exploits. (That's Jason Lee the acting man up there in the top right corner.) Scan borrowed from The Chrome Ball Incident.

Photos on the left by Spike Jonze. The drawing on the right pretty much set the stage for a war on the old guard in skateboarding.

Along with these two graphics.

They were spoofing these very iconic Powell Peralta graphics (by Victor Courtland Johnson) and basically a bunch of dude's careers came to a screeching halt shortly thereafter. I'm obviously oversimplifying, but around this time (1991) street skating became king and almost all of the vertical skating heroes of the 80s found their skill sets and ponytails obsolete. I think that the attitude of popular skateboarding changed around this time as well and things got real snarky real fast.

The graphics that Mckee was producing during this time period (under the direction of Steve Rocco, owner of World Industries and Blind Skateboards) were, for lack of a better term, fucked up. It's funny to look at contemporary skateboard companies who are attempting to create controversial graphics (myself included sometimes) knowing that these came out almost 20 years ago. Nobody has pushed it this far since. I'm not even sure how you would if you wanted to.

The "High Guy" board was eerily prophetic. Glad he turned it around.

I think one of the coolest things about this book is being able to see the visual transformation and demographic shift that World Industries went through in four short years (1992-1996).

Basically transforming themselves from a company creating the most controversial graphics ever seen in skateboarding to a company catering to children. Weird and interesting.

The last section of the book has examples of McKee's most recent graphics. I'm not personally a fan of this type of work, but I really admire the fact that as an illustrator he's able to work in such a variety of styles and mediums.

I had no idea that he was the guy creating these graphics. I had assumed that they (Darkstar) hired a comic book illustrator to make these. Again, these aren't my favorite types of graphics but it's cool that he's so versatile as a designer.

There are also three spreads in the middle of the book with illustrations that were created for Hustler magazine in the mid 90s after Larry Flynt bought Big Brother magazine. But that's a whole 'nother story. If you're interested in any of this stuff then you should track down a copy of The Man Who Souled The World. It's a very interesting documentary…. if you're an aging male skateboarder in your 30s…

No movie review this week. I didn't have time to watch a movie and I don't feel like reviewing a movie from memory right now. Also, I'm going to be out of town next week so Kill The Engine No. 9 won't be up till August 22nd. A good reason not to kill yourself for a few weeks if you were thinking about it.

This is in the book too. Discuss amongst yourselves.

WARNING: The Art of Marc Mckee is available through Mark Batty Publisher.

MICHAEL SIEBEN