Are you ready to check out some wicked anchor grinds, casper flips, full cabs, halfpipes, and ollies?
The Museum of the Moving Image’s Recording the Ride: The Rise of Street-Style Skate Videos runs from Saturday, Sept. 7, until Jan. 26, 2025.
On display in the Amphitheater Gallery, this exhibition consists of videos and artifacts from skateboard culture’s formative years – the late 1980s and 1990s – with a focus on releases that manifest the structure and style that define the modern skate video genre.
These VHS-format videos depict skaters as they show off their skills on stairs, benches, and public structures. Mostly shot with inexpensive cameras featuring fish-eye lenses, many videos contain grainy footage of bodies in flight into music-driven montages.
Highlights include artifacts from the production of “The Bones Brigade Video Show” (1984); a focus on Mike Ternasky and the Plan B brand with vintage production and post-production artifacts used in “The Questionable Video” (1992) and “Virtual Reality” (1993); and behind-the-scenes images, including ones by Spike Jonze, whose filmmaking career began with skate videoes.
MoMI is located at 36-01 35th Ave. in Astoria’s Kaufman Art District.
Recording the Ride results from a collaboration with MoMI Deputy Director for Curatorial Affairs Barbara Miller; Jacob Rosenberg, who has made documentaries and commercials for such brands as Nike, Ford, Verizon, MLB, and NBA; and Michaela A. Ternasky-Holland, a Peabody-nominated and Emmy-winning director. Sponsors include Deckaid, The Secret Tape, and Look Back Library.
Image: blabacphoto/MoMI;
Pictured: Keenan Milton and Aaron Meza. Los Angeles, 1998