What’s the concept behind the Recover Project? I just wanted to give skateboard magazines a second life. It’s sad to see how fast we can forget the magical work from amazing photographers. How long did it take you to do the Recover project? The Recover Project started 3 years ago in my room. I’m a huge fan of skateboard magazines since I discovered this magical piece of Wood in 1990 (I was 9 years old). My mum used to buy me magazines and I’ve kept all of them to this day. I hope this project will never stop! How did you start recovering skate magazines? When I painted on the first cover (Vice mag) I had no idea where it could go. But once I sent it to Vice I knew that something fun was going to happen. They started to send me their magazine every month. So I did the same with Transworld, Thrasher and Place.
Now I receive around 30 different magazines every month. I feel so lucky! How do you choose a particular image to recover? I can’t paint on all the covers that I receive at home. I need to feel it, I need to understand the picture and I need to speak to my monsters to make sure they are down to it. How did you publish the book? After 1 year of drawing I had created around 120 recovers and I started thinking about publishing a book to thank skateboarding and snowboarding for being so awesome! I used to work into the skateboarding world, so I contacted Converse (thanks Luidgi) to ask if they would be down to support this project and they said yes! You can grab it here www.lucasbeaufort-store.com Why did you get Converse to sponsor it? I needed a little bit of money to publish it and I also
knew some people working for the company who are true skateboarders with a real spirit so it made sense to ask them first. I think that they realised how important it is to remember the past, also to respect and to support skateboarding. That’s why I think they agreed. Now that the book is published, how are you telling people about it? When the book was published (October 2013), Converse organized a party in Paris at WAIT www.waitparis.tumblr.com to let people know about the project. I also decided to send the book to all the people involved (magazines, photographers) to spread the word but especially to thank them all. A lot of blogs, prints, radio, T.V talked about this project so I guess that helped with letting people know about it. Social media is also a good way to promote it so of course I used it.
Artist work: BB Bastidas, LucasBeaufort, French, Jeremy Fish, Michael Sieben
Now tell us about the LB project, The LB Project is a European art project through skateboarding. It is a long tour (Berlin, Copenhagen, Barcelona, Paris, Amsterdam, London) from July 2014 till June 2015. For each city there is an exhibition at a skate shop. The first one was in Berlin (July 14) during a trade show named “Bright”. We can compare it with “Agenda” in the US. Each exhibition is different of course. 12 unique skateboards are presented in each place. The second art show was in Copenhagen at Streetmachine www.streetmachine.com and I’m attending the third one that will be hosted by FTC in Barcelona (November 22). Each exhibition will last 3 weeks. You can see the first artworks presented here www.the-lbproject.com All the artworks are created with skateboards. I invite each artist to one art show. French came to Berlin, Mike Kershnar to Copenhagen and Chad Eaton will be in Barcelona. Jeremy Fish and BB Bastidas will be in Amsterdam (March 14),
Kid Creature and Fos in London (May 23). It promises to be Epic. What are the ideas behind it and why did you want to make it happen? My main motivation was to make skateboarding and art accessible to all. All the arts will be donated to people at the end of the project (half to Skateistan and the other half to subscribers). I truly believe of this idea of unifying people for a good cause. Alone we are just nothing. How did you get everyone involved? Damn, it was really hard but I’m stoked that all the artists (Jeremy Fish, Todd Bratrud, Kid Creature, Mike Kershnar, Chad Eaton, Michael Sieben, Fos, French, Jeremyville, BB Bastidas) support the project. First of all I had to explain the project to 30 different people involved (artists, owners of skate shop, media partners). Some of them were hard to convince so I had to really believe in this project to make it
happen. Once that was organized I started to meet brands to get financial support to produce this one yearlong project. It was also really hard to coordinate people (sometimes in holidays, or out of Town for business). Of course you can always improve the way you manage it, such as how to you explain the project to people. For me its pretty simple but for someone who never heard of it, it’s not so easy. So I recommend being clear with people and making sure they understand you. I was really happy to realise that even though skateboarding is getting hurt by a lot of turbulence there is still a lot of strength and positivity. Why do you think there needs to be physical skate shops as opposed to online stores? Skateboarding is about meeting dudes! Without this interaction with people there is no sense to do it. Young kids must support their local skate shop instead of searching of the best price on Internet.
Did you study or have a degree in Art? I didn’t study art at school. I was just lucky to have a nice mum who supported me with doing what I wanted to do when I was a kid. She bought me my first board at Christmas and it was the best present ever. What are the greatest challenges with being an independent artist? I feel so happy to do what I love to do. I live for painting and skateboarding and I wish I could stay like this forever. I’m a hard worker, even when I sleep I think about tomorrow. I’m on holidays while I’m answering your questions. It’s 5 pm and my wife is sleeping next to me. I don’t want to waste our time here so I’m doing it while she sleeps. I’m so motivated by what I’m doing so I don’t feel it’s a job, it’s just what I love to do. How has skateboarding influenced your art? Skateboarding taught me all I know. It teaches me how to be open and accept the world!
Why is art important to skateboarding? I don’t understand when people say, “I don’t care about the graphics”. It’s so important to me. I started to paint because of the graphics under my deck! www.lucasbeaufort.com instagram @lucas_beaufort @the_lbproject