The Story Behind the Surfboard

It seems the City of Ventura is as proud to be associated with artist Steve Cook as we are. The man behind that ubiquitous red chair (see above) was recently featured in his city's State of the Arts newsletter this month for his new found wine-label fame. In the blurb, Cook nicely sums up our thoughts on why we loved his work in the first place. "In regards to the paintings, Foley (Firestone's parent company) thought they were good examples of life on the Central Coast, which is where the wines are from. For me they were all fun pieces to paint and it is really exciting to see my paintings out there in the world." You can subscribe to the newsletter here (though this month's doesn't seem to be posted just yet).

After the newsletter went out, we noticed Steve's Facebook page made a mention of the tri-colored surfboard lying in the sand behind the red Adirondack . We asked him for more details, and it turns out there's a great story behind it. Here it is, in Steve's own words:

The red yellow and green Bonzer surfboard in the Red Chair painting was custom built in the mid 90's by Malcolm Cambpell for me. I surfed on it for 2 years. The colors are significant because they are the Rasta colors and I worked closely with many Rastafarians when I was in the Peace Corps in Jamaica in the mid 70's. Kind of became a Rasta myself.

This design of this board is fairly unique. It has 5 fins with dual concaves on the bottom. Malcolm and his brother Duncan, both originally from Oxnard in Ventura County, invented this design. It worked well in any size wave. Many of the world's top surfers ride or have ridden their 5 fin Bonzer design.

I traded it in when I got a new board a couple of years later. A few years went by and I saw a friend walking down my street with it. He had bought it at a garage sale. I shouted "Hey! I'll buy that from you" and he sold it to me for $50. I was glad to get it back. It is truly a collectors item and means a lot too me. It has also been in 1 other painting ("Surfboards in the Garden") which is on my website. It is semi-retired these days but brings back a lot of fond memories.