Oyster Magazine

Oyster #95: Mark Gonzales

For Oyster issue #95 Joseph Allen Shea interviewed Mark Gonzales, iconic skateboarder and artist. Gonzales gave us his take on pretty much everything:

Without intending to, Mark Gonzales has achieved a legendary status, not only for his skateboarding prowess and prolific art practice, but also for his aloofness and unpredictable antics. Having worked with him for three years before we even exchanged words — all correspondence had been through his wife — this summer in Paris I was able to pin him down long enough for an interview, albeit a rambling and slightly random one.

Joseph Allen Shea: Your background is skateboarding, but I also think you could say that you’ve been a proponent of the crossover between skateboarding and art. It’s a popular belief that they do go hand-in-hand, skateboarding and creativity. Would you agree?
Mark Gonzales: Definitely. Skateboarding and creativity go hand-in-hand for sure.

So, you think it’s quite an artistic pursuit, skateboarding?
Yeah. Well, it opens your mind, you know? Especially if you invent tricks — to invent a new trick, especially nowadays, is rare. Everything’s been done, you know? You do it one way, then you reverse it … And then in art you can always think of things like that too. A lot of artists are obsessed with turning things inside out, or flipping them over, upside down, or like… It’s so childlike.

You’re also reappropriating existing structures; changing the elements, or the materials, that you’re dealing with.
Well, a lot of the artists are changing now. A lot of the… not the artists are changing, but [rather] the methods with which they create their work are changing.

And do you think this is…
I don’t think it has anything to do with skateboarding.

What about publishing and mass-producing? Is that important to you and your practice, or is it just something that comes afterwards?
Well, books are, like, the best … You know, you should see my library collection.

It’s big?
Yeah. It’s in San Francisco and New York.

So big you had to spread it over two cities?
Yeah.

What’s important about books?
As a kid, I always enjoyed looking through books. That was my favourite thing. And when I came across naughty books, I was always tempted to go back to them, but I was scared; I’d hide them and put them back and pretend that I didn’t see them.

You missed the opening of the show [Public Domaine, a group show at La Gaîté Lyrique, Paris, in which Gonzales was exhibiting] the other day because you were sleeping…
I don’t like people.

You don’t like people? Really? You don’t like crowds?
No, I just — I mean, sure, put me in Venice with a bunch of tourists and I’m fine, but put me in a skateboard venue with a bunch of skateboarders and I’m not fine. I just feel weird.

Is it an attention thing? Getting too much attention?
Well, I like to skateboard, and that’s it. You know what I mean? The popularity comes with it, but… I mean, you can do something you like, but when you become admired for it or, like, ‘idolified’, it becomes something that you’re not able to comprehend yourself. You know what I’m saying? It’s like sometimes they wanna punch you.

The public?
Or someone who admires you so much they wanna hit you, or they wanna grab you, or they wanna, like, touch you or give you things; they leave presents for you. Strange things like this.

And people get violent? Because their admiration makes them violent, or over-excited?
Yeah, yeah. They just get excited.

And then, I guess, as you say, you’re “idolified”; you become like a commodity. That turns something that’s about love into work, I suppose.
Well, I’m always working. This interview is work. But I enjoy doing it; I don’t mind. The funniest thing is that, ah, you watch kids playing, and sometimes they chase pigeons and stuff, you know? I can’t wait for the day when I see pigeons chasing children.

I like that, good analogy… You told me you’ve been sleeping a lot.
Yeah. I’ve been into taking sleeping pills, lately.

Why is that? Just catching up?
No. I just like sleeping, it’s nice. Dreaming.

If you don’t take pills are you a good sleeper?
No, I can’t sleep. I’m up like a light bulb, 24/7. I’m all energy.

What, to wear yourself out?
Yeah, I need to do something. Skateboarding… I need to do skateboarding or, like, carving or, like, hitting things, painting…

Something super-energetic, to use up all that energy.
Have sex with girls… You have to take sleeping pills if you have too much libido. Otherwise you go around groping girls.

Gonzales is a Spanish name, yeah? How far back is the Spanish history of your family?
Well, my grandfather, his name is Jay — Jay Gonzales — and he was from, uh… Sinaloa, in Mexico. He always thought that he was from Spain, from Seville, but he was real tiny, and he had an afro [laughs], and he was real dark.

So, you’ve got a place in San Francisco and a place in New York?
No, no; I don’t. I got kicked out of both.

So who’s got your library?
My ex.

Is there a big difference between the West Coast and the East Coast of the US?
Not really. The whole world is becoming one. Most people are starting to speak English now, and they’re all on the internet and they’re all iChatting each other and, like, everybody’s starting to speak the same language.

Do you think it’s connecting people?
Well, listen — me and you are having a conversation pretty simply, and you don’t have a heavy Australian accent, I don’t have a heavy American accent; I would call it, like, a global accent.

Maybe I’m not that modern in thinking, but I like going to new places and…
Well, the only culture is in the ghetto.

Have you spent any time in the suburbs of Paris?
No. I don’t really like the ghettos; I avoid them. I remember Mike Tyson, whenever he went to anywhere, he always used to say, right when he got there, “Take me to your ghetto.”

So, you see yourself living in France for a while now? You sticking it out?
Yeah. France for a while, then maybe Madrid. Maybe I’ll go to Seville [laughs].

Yeah? Get back to your…
My roots, yeah.

Possible roots. And you’ve spent a bunch of time in New Zealand as well…
Yeah, I love New Zealand. They’re cool there. They got good morals.

Morals?
Yeah.

Where do you think that comes from? Why would they have more morals than people from, say, some other country?
They got no nukes.

No nukes?
They’re nuclear-free, they pick up their garbage, they’re just… They don’t litter as much, they’re just stand-up, you know? They’re not into, like, the American culture.

Which is wasteful — is that what you mean?
Yeah. What happens to something, it doesn’t matter. I think it has to do with the British, with the British colonising it and then, like, from the British rule, it taught it to be, like, how it is.

It’s really interesting to me that the British took over both Australia and New Zealand, and I know hardly any Australian Aboriginals, but I know heaps of Maoris. They were this warrior race that were able to protect themselves, but the Aborigines, they just got slaughtered, you know? Still, I think the last full-blooded Maori died not that long ago.
It’s crazy, cause one black guy was killed in America, in Texas…

When?
A long time ago. One black guy was killed, and nothing happened, there were no consequences… One white person got killed by a black clan — fourteen black people died.

This was when?
A long time ago, during Howard Hughes’ time. So, it’s like, you can’t touch whites… Johnnie Cochran’s dead.

Who’s Johnnie Cochran?
He’s the guy that represented OJ [Simpson].

What happened?
Cancer, or something. I’ve got Barry Scheck’s autograph.

Who?
Barry Scheck.

I don’t know who that is either.
He’s one of the lawyers who defended OJ and got him off.

Oh, he’s famous for being a lawyer? You got his autograph? On what? On a photograph?
Yeah I got his autograph, and Peter Neufeld’s.

Someone else I don’t know — another lawyer?
Yeah.

On the same case?
Yeah. I get random people’s autographs. I got Jodie Foster’s autograph, I got Elizabeth Peyton’s autograph, I got Gregory Hines’ autograph. I got so many autographs.

Really? So you track these down?
No, I see them on the street and I get their autograph.

What’s your interest in celebrities?
Nothing, I get people’s autograph and then I lose it [laughs]. I don’t keep ‘em.

There are a lot of autographs in the Richard Prince exhibition [in Paris].
Are they authentic? I don’t like Richard Prince.

Why not?
I don’t know. I just don’t like it. I don’t like girls on Harleys.

OK. That’s a big series of his.
I like guys on Harleys. I like the famous picture of Steve McQueen on a Harley. He’s fucking glowing.

What’s the difference between a man and a female on a bike?
I like men! I like to bone women, but I like to look at a man. Men are great! I’m a man; I’m not a woman. You know, you like to see a man, even if he’s a little bit feminine, still he’s a man; you like him, you know what I mean?

Are these aspirational characters we’re talking about?
I’m just talking in general, like on the street, you know what I mean? Sometimes people see you and if they like you they smile… Sometimes you see someone, you walk past them, and they spit, cause they don’t like you. They don’t like the look of you.

How often does that happen to you?
In New York, every day.

Really?
Yeah!

I’ve never seen this. Is this like a cultural thing? If they don’t like you, they spit on the ground?
Especially in Chinatown, they go [makes spitting motion]; they’re spitting left and right cause they don’t like you.

This is a Chinese cultural thing, or an American thing?
A New York thing.

A New York thing. New York is its own country.
In Paris, too, I’ve noticed it… Do you think that’s a long enough interview?

Pardon me?
Is that a long enough interview?

Oh yeah, totally. I mean, I think there’s so much, like, chitchat that doesn’t need to be in there, but, uh, yeah, yeah. It’s totally fine…

Coconut Records, ‘Any Fun’
Directed by Mark Gonzales. Featuring Mark Gonzales, Chloe Sevigny and skateboarder Alex Olson as well as Jason Schwartzman’s band Coconut Records

Joseph Allen Shea runs Izrock Pressings, publisher of Le Cercle: Benjamin Deberdt / Mark Gonzales.

Words: Joseph Allen Shea
Photography: Benjamin Deberdt
www.izrock.com

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