MAGIC WAX

Just received a fabulous block of Barbary's Organic Magic Wax made from her very own honey bees down in Middleton, SA.

Barbary and I went to the Mentawai's last year and had a fab time surfing some seriously gnarly waves. We went out at KFC's after deciding not to surf Macca's due to over crowding by 8 boatloads of pretty determined guys. But a rogue set thoroughly wiped us out and as per this accurate representation of the incident I lost my board. Luckily I had a spare legrope but those suspicious floating particles that were being pumped out raw and macerated from the hulls of all those boats got into me had me laid up for a few days. 

Barbary reclaimed her dignity and powered on in style. She recently held a SALA Open Studio Event titled 'Surfing Isn't All I Think About' featuring some paintings of flaming pubes. And she's concocting a 'Wax On' cartoon for our delectation too in response to what she calls the purile macho rag that is Tracks.

She may even do some kids workshops during the holidays if we can lure her up to the Big Smoke.

VENUS DE GOULD

Spotted this fridge painted by Palm Beach based artist Bruce Gould in the Sayan region of Bali recently. Bruce is another cosmic Yellow House survivor and is responsible for many classic Mambo designs. Here he has created a vision splendid of a surfer dude who has ditched his board for a shell a la Botticelli's 'The Birth of Venus'.

HAZELBROOK TO HAZELHURST

Paid a visit to Fogg Hall in Hazel-brook yesterday where Ellis D and the Fogg tech support team were working on the infamous 'Wave Of Stoke' light installation (pictured). Mr Fogg introduced me to Rhiannnon, his young apprentice and showed me the tattooed wave on the nape of her neck which had inspired the light work. He also gave me a tour of his HQ which featured a wild collection of shoes from his days as a shoe fetishist and some classic Martin Sharp prints from the psychedelic Yellow House days.

Mr Sharp has played with waves himself - check out 'Babylon the great is fallen. Revelations 18 v2' (2000-2006). This work will feature in an exhibition at the Museum of Sydney opening Oct 31st but in the meantime, Ellis D is riding his own wave of illuminated success. He's off to India again tomorrow where he is being rediscovered as the light master that he is. And Hazelhurst Gallery will be mounting a show of his work in the gardens during Feburary.

Regarding the light in the centre of the barrel of his wave, he says it's "the cosmic eye" - or, as they used to say back in the '70s, "cos-fucking-mic!"

COMMUNITY OUTREACH

Following a shout-out in the Shire News the gallery was besieged by locals offering up all sorts of memorabilia from much treasured surfing trophies to old planks with their original surf craft permits still attached! Yes, amazing though it seems to us today, there was a time when you had to pay for the privilege of paddling out. 

Graham Beetson from Heathcote (pictured below) still had his 1964/'65 permit stuck on the tail of his old Ron surfboard along with the actual receipt from the Sutherland Council for 34 pounds, which seems like an awful lot of money for those days, especially for "a factory second". 

Money is no object for Peter Sheil (above) who has an impressive collection of 35 vintage boards (the other 20 in the garage are for his own  personal use). The most valuable stick in his quiver is a 1963 balsa wood Mal, again with its original permit attached. Worth about 10k the board stays on the display rack in Peter's living room but over at Mark Riley's place in Miranda there are some excellent boards made of balsa wood on offer for a test ride. Mark uses recycled polystyrene sourced from Foamex in Reevesby, Sydney for his blanks then decks them out with thin sheets of light-as-a-feather balsa wood imported from Ecuador. I'm sold on their enviro cred so I'm taking one out for a ride next week. If all goes well, I'll be the proud owner of a brand new Wax On board.

ZINE AGE RIOT

Speaking of riots, Wax On artist (and Mambo dude) Paul McNeil is hosting a Zine Fair at his Sea Cell gallery at 41 Acacia St in the Byron Bay industrial estate this Saturday (8.8.2009) to coincide with the Byron Bay Writers Festival. They've installed a 9ft high ramp in the gallery space for kids to skate on - check out the pics on his website at http://www.seasurfboards.com/news.php

In fact, it was talk of this very zine fair back in January that prompted my to start this blog so thanks Paulie! Wish I was there for the ride.

In the meantime, we're dusting off the Hazelhurst billboards in preparation for your rockin' banners. Who said we couldn't post bills? 

SURF RIOT

Had a waxy meltdown the other night as I watched some work in progress by Gold Coast artist Scott Redford. Already onboard with his 2007 flashing neon light installation 'Surf Nauman: Surf/Riot in my handwriting' (pictured), Redford has raised the tow bar on the Wax On ute with a series of screen tests for a filmic piece about a young surfie artist dude he's invented named Reinhardt Dammn. 

As Redford says; "Reinhardt is an experiment in art to test the limit of current notions of originality and authorship." As screenwriter, set designer and co-director Redford shot

the footage  at Caloundra High School against a classroom  blackboard with a bunch of kids reciting the line 'I am Reinhardt Dammn'. Like the documentary 'Unmistaken Child', which followed a Tibetan Buddhist monk in search of the reincarnation of his master, it's perfectly clear when the real deal appears. He is the one we've been waiting for. With his salty sun bleached blonde hair encrusted in the shape of a wave over his forehead he stares at the camera unflinchingly, unlike the other kids who squirm and giggle and generally can't keep a straight face. This boy allows the viewer into his creative space as he seriously strums a dodgy guitar prop sprayed silver by Redford. And all the while a gorgeous teen babe wearing a singlet and mini-skirt draws the perfect wave in chalk on the blackboard. Bliss.

Hopefully we'll be able to screen some of this in the show alongside Redford's video performance entitled 'Dead Board 1 - 4' which had a very popular outing in Caloundra a while ago and features a variety of surfie boys and girls sawing old waterlogged boards in half, each one spray painted with the word 'DEAD' on it. There may even be a 'Dead Board 5' ready in time to accompany it.