Got Wood?
This weekend marks the fourth annual Wooden Surfboard celebration in Australia. In honor of the occasion, we asked Grant Newby, the founder of the day who has a blog about wooden boards, a few questions about this passion: HB: Could you explain why wood is good? Newby: I believe people from all walks of life have […]
Cave Cleaning in Greece
Artist Pam Longobardi is in Greece cleaning sea caves filled with plastic and debris. For Drifters Project/Kefalonia Phase II, she plans to clean the cave with a team of swimmers, remove all the material and transport it to the Ionion Center of Art and Culture to document, analyze and create a single large-scale art installation […]
Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math
If the pictures of those towering wildfires in Colorado haven’t convinced you, or the size of your AC bill this summer, here are some hard numbers about climate change: June broke or tied 3,215 high-temperature records across the United States. That followed the warmest May on record for the Northern Hemisphere – the 327th consecutive […]
Human Nature
If you’ve always wanted to check out Jason deCaires Taylor‘s mesmerizing underwater sculptures but haven’t made it to The Museum of Underwater Modern Art in Mexico, you’re in luck. Starting tomorrow, you can see his work at the Jonathan Levine Gallery in New York from June 30 until July 28, 2012. The show includes a new […]
Tim Jackson: “Let’s Be Less Productive”
An interesting article in the NYT recently argues that we’re “hooked on growth.” An excerpt: At first, this may sound crazy; we’ve become so conditioned by the language of efficiency. But there are sectors of the economy where chasing productivity growth doesn’t make sense at all. Certain kinds of tasks rely inherently on the allocation […]
Carl Safina’s “The View from Lazy Point”
Carl Safina, a MacArthur Foundation “Genius Grant”–winning ocean scientist, recently published The View from Lazy Point, a lyrical, evocative, and humane story of mankind’s relationship with nature. The book opens with fifty pages describing the change from winter to spring at Safina’s home on the North Fork of Long Island, then continues with journeys in the […]
Countdown to Bike Sharing in NYC
New York City’s massive new bike share program is inching ever closer to its July debut. To that end, the city has announced not only the name of the program’s $41 million sponsor (Citibank) but also the program’s official name (CitiBike, of course) and, most important of all, the exact pricing for the program. And if you were […]
Tree to Sea
Here’s a short movie by Barry Mottershead—one of the foremost chargers of the Ireland big wave scene—showing the handcrafting of an Alaia board from Paulownia wood. You’ll usually find Barry crashing around on huge Irish waves, so here’s some more mellow radness. Music by Siskiyou – Twigs and Stones.—from Drift Surfing
John Jeremiah Sullivan: “Always wanted to write about surfing”
From KQED: You’ve written about everything from Michael Jackson to Hurricane Katrina to touring with Guns ‘n’ Roses to an 18th-century German who worked to unite Native Americans against colonialism. Is there a subject you’ve always wanted to write about, but haven’t had the chance? John Jeremiah Sullivan: Always wanted to write about surfing. —Sullivan’s Pulphead was […]
Shattered Debris, Sheer Transformation
Creating domestic environments from found objects, resin, latex, lights, and her unique expressionistic process of shattering and re-forming glass, artist Hu Bing’s site-specific installation ‘Shattered Debris, Sheer Transformation’ is now on display at the Flatiron Prow Art Space on the ground floor of the Flatiron Building.
Postcard from the Farm
We’ve returned to the farm up north where things are in full pre-season swing. Going from first light clean through till near dark. We now have happy piglets, spring chicks and bees!
We Are All Radioactive
We Are All Radioactive, a documentary series, tells the story of one seaside community’s efforts to rebuild in the wake of the 2011 disaster. Motoyoshi, a small town and surf spot about 100 miles from Fukushima, was devastated by the earthquake and tsunami, and now it’s unclear how damaging the effects of the Fukushima meltdown could be. We Are […]
America’s Greenest Cities
In honor of Earth Day—which was founded in 1970 by Wisconsin Sen. Gaylord Nelson—the Daily Beast ranked the greenest cities in the U.S. Can you guess who won? A hint: there are lots of surfers there.
The Island President
Jon Shenk’s The Island President is the story of President Mohamed Nasheed of the Maldives and the survival of his country and everyone in it. As one of the most low-lying countries in the world, a rise of three feet in sea level would submerge the 1200 islands of the Maldives enough to make them […]
David Thorne & elysian
I recently interviewed artist and cook David Thorne about an event space and occasional restaurant he’s running in Los Angeles: elysian. His background includes farming in Vermont and working with the famed Bread and Puppet Theater, as well as participating in the Whitney Independent Study program and producing very interesting work with his wife Julia Meltzer (among […]
Surfrider Film Contest
How can you capture something as valuable as water in 3 seconds? Surfrider asked their supporters to do just that in super short films. More than 160 people sent in films from all over the planet (France, South Africa, Australia, Romania…). Surfrider edited the three-second clips together and added music by Zee Avi. See the […]
Valérie Buess
Swiss-born artist, Valérie Buess, gives old books new life by creating these amazing three-dimensional sculptures that look like sea creatures.
NASA Finds 2011 Ninth-Warmest Year on Record
The global average surface temperature in 2011 was the ninth warmest since 1880, according to NASA scientists. The finding continues a trend in which nine of the 10 warmest years in the modern meteorological record have occurred since the year 2000. NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in New York, which monitors global surface […]
Flotsam & Jetsam
Pam Longobardi creates art with plastic objects collected on beaches. Her work reveals just how big our oceans’ plastic problem has become.
Origami Whales Project
Since 2004, the Origami Whales Project (OWP) founded by Peggy Oki, has worked to raise awareness concerning threats to cetaceans (dolphins and whales) through its “Curtain of 36,000 Origami Whales.” Created by thousands of concerned citizens across the globe and exhibited throughout the world, this large-scale public art project serves as a powerful visual statement […]
21st-Century Cruising
Looking for an adventure? Consider a spot aboard a 72-foot steel-hulled sloop called the Sea Dragon for their cruise to an ocean garbage patch happening this May. Sponsored by Algalita Marine Research Foundation, 5 Gyres Institute and Pangaea Explorations, LLC, paying guests ($13,500 per person) can join scientists and educators to sail through the projected debris […]
Tipping Barrels
Follow surfers Arran and Reid Jackson on a trip into the Great Bear Rainforest on the Pacific coast of Canada, one of few untouched forests of the world and an area threatened by the oil industry. Learn more at pacificwild.org
Latest Work by Jason deCaires Taylor
Time Bomb depicts a collection of bombs and mines designed to support marine life whilst symbolizing the critical future of our reef systems and the countdown of time we have to reverse the increasing worldwide decline. The works also portray the irony of weapons of destruction being used to support and nurture life. The various […]
Great Pacific Garbage Patch
It’s pretty easy to disconnect from the impact our plastic habit has on the environment. But when you find yourself swimming in floating bits of garbage (as I did last summer in Far Rockaway), or you see an image like the one above, the impact is immediate and unavoidable. To learn more and bring awareness […]
