I interviewed skate trophy artist Daryl Smith for the new issue of Modart. He transforms old skateboards into amazing looking, tactile objects used as trophies for skate contests, as well as exhibiting them as works of art. He sent me this photo of his latest trophy from Scotland's War of the Thistles comp back in April. The trophy - a sword in two parts to represent the two halves of the competition - can be seen in Modart under construction, but here it is being held aloft by the two winners.

Brian Lotti who I interviewed in Modart #14 is premiering his new skate movie Free Pegasus later this week in LA. Following on from his first film 1st & Hope: a beautifully crafted movie about skating in LA, Free Pegasus details a day in the life of a group of friends skating in Barcelona. There's a taster of the movie up on the official website www.freepegasus.com as well as some of Brian's artwork and storyboards, plus details and background to the film. Can't wait to see it.

Finally managed to get my mitts on one of these excellent new Designarium boards designed by Dave Kinsey, as mentioned in a previous post back in April. It's now hanging on our wall. Hoorah!

A few weekends ago Chris dusted off his tattoo machines after a three year break and I was first in the queue to go under the needle. He re-lined and re-blacked the Om on my wrist for me which needed a touch up. I managed to take a few reasonable pics with my left hand while he was at work. Click more info to see the rest.

The 15th annual Mystic Sk8 Cup is taking place in Prague on Friday 4th July until Sunday 6th. Running alongside the skate comp is the art exhibition Subkultura, which is taking on a slightly different approach to last year, with all artists submitting digital images which will be printed out and displayed at the event. Check out the Mystic Sk8 Cup website HERE for all the info. The graphics for the event are produced by Concrete 2 Canvas contributor and Modart featured artist Martin Fischer, who also organises Subkultura.

Sao Paulo artist Sesper has a new solo show opening tomorrow 1st July. Formol is an exhibition of new collage works by Sesper, "developed intuitively from recycled material which had been piled up in the artist's studio for decades." Sesper is also behind a forthcoming movie about the Brazilian skateboard graphics with the emphasis on the art, called ReBoard. Check out the movie blog at http://reboard.blogspot.com