Februar 5th, 2020

DogTown – The Legend of the Z-Boys, C.R. Stecyk III & Glen E. Friedman

Posted in bücher by Dolf

Akashic Books, 222 Third St., Suite A 115, Brooklyn, NY 11215, Usa, www.akashicbooks.com

This book war originally published by Burning Flag Press in 2000, this years (2019) second edition is in cooperation with Akashic Books.
Stecyk is a veteran skateboard journalist who wrote articles and took photos for SkateBorder Magazine about the Southern California skateboard culture of the 1970s and ’80s. Friedman is a photographer who has taken some of the most iconic photos in skateboarding, punk rock and hip-hop (so they say). The first part of the book has plenty of articles by Stecyk including great b/w images. He writes about and introduces people like Stacy Peralta, Jay Adams and Tony Alva among others, to the reader.

At a time when those skaters where far away from beeing the icons they are nowadays. There is a lot of text and if you are not a hardcore old school skate fan, this might be a bit too much… nonetheless, the photos are great and as a whole it gives the reader a good idea what was going on back in the day in Southern Californian skateboarding. The second part of the book is mostly rare full color DogTown photographs by Friedman from his picture archive (1975 – 1985+). Apart from the fact that he happened to be at the right place in the right time, he also does take great photos of the skaters and he pictured them all. There is a short text where, who and when shot. When I was trying not to fall off my board in the mid seventies riding down the hill, these kids already shreded pools, ramps and banks. A awesome collection of great photos that take the reader in a time tunnel. There is no girls on boards to see, not sure if that is because no girls skated back then or for other reasons. If you read between the lines you can tell, some (most/all?) of these DogTown / Z-Boys dudes have been ego self centered brats in their teens and books like this of course help to fuel the legend, but hey, it was a long time ago and it is about skateboarding. So lets have some fun with this 24 x 23 cm coffee table book with 256 pages – of course it is hardcover. 34,99 $ US (dolf)

Isbn 978-1617756993

[Trust # 199 December 2019]

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