What is What

ABOVE: Painted Skateboard Griptape Graphics To Communicate medical usage of Crutches with a Skateboard To Complete Strangers. The graphics emulate existing color and symbols in public space for safety boundaries and disabled people. I also added the Red Cross with MED written inside it to further reinforce the message. Normally graphics are painted on the bottom of the board and the tops are black griptape. Communicating through symbols from the top of the board is a very useful way to answer questions without them being asked.

CLICK ON IMAGE ABOVE TO READ MY INTERVIEW ON VEGANSKATEBLOG.COM

ABOVE: Arrested For Protesting Skateboarding Ban In Pittsburgh 1988

ABOVE: A Rainbow Arcs Across the Sky At WildReds Gardens. A peaceful moment. A gift from nature. Awe inspiring and humbling. There are very few moments in my life where I am setback from all the current contexts political personal etc. and can just breath and watch. This was one of them. It was hard to take a picture because I just wanted to look. A double rainbow floating in the mist on the first day of June of 2012.

ABOVE: Custom Skateboard Paintjob @ Parade Starting Point /Photo by THOS

NYC DANCE PARADE 2012 was a fun and exhausting affair. I danced every block two or three times using my skateboard to exhibit my Step-N-Roll Flavor. I cannot really decide on how to title the form. Is it Stepping-Roll, Steppin-Roll or Step-N-Roll .. These are the kind of decisions I am not very good at making. Tons more images after the jump

Greetings dear Readers. It has been far too long since I have last posted here. If you have been with me since the beginning then you are well aware that I do have these long breaks between posts. This site is not really a bloggers site, in the blogger sense of blogging daily, but rather an artist's site that starts and stops and starts again with a regular irregularity.

ABOVE: "Keep Dancing" Intaglio Ink Print on Archival Paper 8x10 2012

ABOVE: Stepping Roll Toe Up Footwork on a cruiser board

I often times i send you here because i have just met you and you have asked me a question. Often times I dont know your name and you dont know mine. If you came here I first off want to Sincerely Thank You for not reacting negatively to my answer of " if you really want to know the answer to your question go to my website whatiswhat.com I cannot expain now". Thank you for not letting your ego misinterpret negatively me just trying to get on with my life without expaining something to you as I have been asked so many times before. Its not personal at all. I dont always say -go to my website- to every person that does ask me questions. There are many factors. If I sent you here and you came for an explanation of the specifics of why I came to skate with crutches that story is here. " What happened to you?" What do you call that" What kind of crutches are those" What happened to your leg? " etc.etc.etc. These are the questions that I am asked and whatiswhat.com remains a tool for me to deflect some of the inquisitive if disbelieving attempts to figure me out.

ABOVE: The crowded floor of Sullivan Room opens up just enough for me to squeeze in a few choice steps but the powder on the floor makes the crutch tips slide around so much that I would lose control. For those of you following my blog you may remember a previous post about Juste Debout France plastic floor with seams.

There will always be those select house dancers that love to throw down their powder and get their groove on, slipping and sliding around with an extra touch of smoothness coming from the baby powder dusted floor surface. While recently out on the town in NYC I went to hear the amazingly talented Ian Friday spin at Sullivan Room as part of the long running Thursday Night Global Soul Dance Party, Libations. While hanging out warming up and just enjoying the music I felt the amount of powder on the floor was making it a bit dangerous for me to do anything beyond the most conservative two step. In the pictoral sequence after the jump you will see my solution to this powder floor problem as taken from ramp skaters who mopped their entire ramps with a coke/water mix to get the masonite dust out of their kinetic equation. While I too have applied the same idea to entire stages when too dusty for a show a club is a bit different in that you might get kicked out if you are caught dousing the floor in Jack and Cokes. Thus for clubs I switch out mopping the entire dance floor with a coke/water mix to making a small area of the floor my tip and shoe sticky zone by pouring the liquid onto a napkin in an out of the way location that doesnt get cleaned up too quickly.

ABOVE: "In-Saddle Float" performed Traveling ( as oppposed to single position circular ) from The Shannon Technique

I am posting up this image of me performing an In-Saddle-Float on single point crutches to make the point that my dancing came from within my heart and spiritual connection to music and the "urbanity" of my form prior to attaining and evolving the rocker bottom crutch design.So many kind people have written to me about how they want to dance on crutches but need to find a rockerbottom set to get started. My response is just start moving.

ABOVE: Here is a quick video of a wearable mobile video prop I made from screen scraps, baling wire, electrical tape, a micro projector and a microcamera. I made this prop to test the viability of a more fleshed out method of fabricating a lighter weight version of my "Invisible Series" that is meant to function in a more mobile-esque manner. Thanks to James Clotfelter on the fabrication assist and Ravish Momin drum sounds.

BELOW: detail of headmount and microcamera

ABOVE: more fabrication details, lots of black gaff to hide any reflections

ABOVE: Video Still

Popped on the headphones for some Stepping Roll in the post-rain slickeryness while waiting for The Bus today. A very flowshow lyrical tangent. love those wet 540 power slides and gaping 180's from fakie down the hill ( yes FAKIE )

ABOVE: I like to drink my tea in a taller glass rather than the traditional tea cup. The glass has no handle yet is very hot. With the insulation quality of the tetrapak I can protect my fingers and retain heat in the glass. Especially good for winter teas and coffees.

The video is pretty self evident but there are some details that are important. Maybe the next time I will narrate but for now I will just write. The video starts with a shot of the tetrapaks soaking in grey water. In this case the water is rain water collected over

ABOVE: temporary arrangement of found objects and fabricated elements untitled

I have fabricated several small metal characters in light metals like brass, silver and thin sheet steel over the years. I have taken these small creations and built or arranged little worlds that the characters I fabricated then exist in. I change these micro-installations...

ABOVE: BLOWFISH STRATEGY. In my world of phenomenology and identification of sociological dynamics in public space the development of performed "strategies" as tools to unlock disable or otherwise transform the implications on my life of a given phenomena are important. The BLOWFISH STRATEGY is part of my engagement with the almost constant phenomena of AMBIGUITY OF DISABILITY. In other words...

In my haste to post up the step by step of breaking down a tetrapak I skipped over the various phases I have ongoing with my tetrapaks. The easiest way is to process them as they come. Taking on a bulk load or waiting till you have a bulk load is more daunting and might cause your tetrapak dedication to waver. Many restaurants throw these away ten or twenty a day. If your partner is a foodie like mine then there will be no shortage of these amazing little boxes.

ABOVE: three of the most common sizes I encounter. Note that the larger tetrapak on the left was processed later in my tetrapak journey as the edges are clean. The tetrapaks to the right were processed early on and reflect a certain ignorance as to the importance of clean edges.

Processing tetrapaks is not fun but the end result is well worth it. after the jump I show the various states of tetrapaks in my possession

I open and flatten the tetrapaks like this to try and retain clean edges. I try and use grey water to rinse them out first. This slower flattening process serves me well when I use the tetrapaks in my work later on down the line.  This 18 image sequential is step one of what I plan to be a six step process to a finished product.

ABOVE: pillow with arrow indication of where my dreams may have taken place