The Disposable Skateboard Bible – Sean Cliver
Gingkopress Verlag, Hamburger Strasse 180, 22083 Hamburg
www.gingkopress.com
You thought there is a lot of skateboards in the 2004 release of Clivers “Disposable” book? You think that can not be topped? You are wrong. Sean Cliver topped himself. There is 1000″s (thousends) of skateboards pictured in this 368 page hardcover (229×279) reference book. It starts off with a introduction, talks about collecting skateboards and in general, introduces you to the Skatelab and the Board Gallery and then it is skateboards, skateboards, skateboards in chronical chapters 1960 – 1970, 1970 – 1980, 1980 – 1990 and 1990 – 2000. There was even a section planned for post 2000 boards, but the author ran out of room.
Therefore you only get to see a couple of Bulldog decks before you enter the “Freestyle Ghetto” followed by “Prototypes” and a gallery of boards that have been navigated by pioneers and pros. It ends with a bunch of signed decks. That would be enough history for your eyes only, but you also get lots of storys, anecdotes and historylessons from skaters, designers and industry people – some of them have been in the skate biz since the beginning! I thought of nameing names, but I save that – everybody is in here. No need to pick out any “special” person, skater or story – they are all famous, rich or legends and have mostly interesting storys to tell.
Which is good, it would have been deadly to only have all those boards there, but this way the text decentralizes nicely. Did I mention that every board is “cataloged”? You get the name of the company, name of board, name of artist and the year it was produced – what else can you ask for! Well, you could ask for variations – those are in there too, no worrys. I ind the old decks way more interesting than the newer stuff, even thou the graphics on the newer decks are more colourful and some have lots of artistic value – others don`t. Of course it is also interesting to see the development of shapes over the decades and that makes hope that the days of the “stick” are counted. Did you know the irst skateboard in Germany was made back in the late 1960s? The “Original Rollbrettl” – there is so much amazing stuff one can discover, it is a trip thru the whole of skateboard history.
Did I mention that there is also some old ads from the 60s. Did I mention there is not very many pictures of people skateing. Did I mention I found the Banzai deck. (I remember in the mid 1970s I went to a store with a poster to copy the shape of the Banzai deck, so my father could make my own aluminium deck at the factory he was working in since the original Banzai deck was way too expensive for me I remember it had a pair of ACS trucks, but cant remember what wheels and, I”m getting carried away here.) Did I mention that the book looks great. Did I mention the layout looks great. (the print of the description of the boards could be a bit bigger, but it might be me magnifying glass helps). Did I mention that some of those collectors are insane. But I”m glad that they are out there to preserve all these boards. Did I mention you need to get this book. 39,90 Euro (dolf)
Isbn 978-1-58423-327-5
