Santa Cruz-expat Ira Mowen's odd project about a once-a-day wave that is, suddenly, in grave peril!
Can you imagine what it’s like to be a surfer living in Berlin? Yeah, sure, you’ve got all those cultural hits playing (marvel at the Brandenburg gate, the Reichstag, hunks of the old Berlin Wall, stroll down the Kurfustendamm, hit the bars and clubs) but old habits die the hardest.
Ira Mowen drifted into Berlin from the States and had soon accrued all the attachments necessary for modern hipsterdom (moto, cute cams, twin fin, mat, journals, Polaroids, long hair parted delicately in the middle and accessorised with beard etc) but was missing the most important ingredient, waves to shred.
And then after six years, there it was. The massive wake created by a poorly designed ship coming back to port, once a day. Head-high, fast and fat.
“Like a head-high swell hitting 38th, in Capitola in Santa Cruz,”, says Mowen.
Except it’s real hard to catch. So hard Mowen had a seven-foot, twin-keel Simmons-style sled built for the joint.
Anyway, the ship that creates the wave is being replaced by a ship that’s sleeker, faster, with a hull that ain’t got the same gas-guzzling drag. But sleeker equals no wave. And so Mowen is making a film (and selling tees, books, framed photos too) about the experience.
Throw some cash at his Kickstarter (click here) and at least let’s get some pretty pictures of it before it vanishes…
Surf Berlin: 60 seconds from Ira Mowen on Vimeo.
…when you only have one element of surprise, I believe it pays to hold onto it for as long as the viewer can bear. But, yeah, we hear you. It is very close to parody.
Would it have killed him to have included a single clip of him riding this wave? I get that it’s an art project, but come on.