We didn’t find Yoann… he found us, and we are extremely thankful that this young chap did. Two things are wonderful about this guy from the start.

No1; we love his site Skate-Site an amazing collection of old, weird, incredible skate history.

And No2 we really dig his photography skills. Both these golden marks of talent can be seen on his site. So anyway we didn’t stop at just knowing two great things about the chap…we called him up and endeavored to find out more here is what we uncovered…

Site: www.skate-site.com

FMCS: Hey Yoann how’s things?

It’s going well, summer is here at last!… that means sunny days, warm weather, grilling, picnics by the river, camping on the beach, surfing and sidewalk surfing…I like summer, I was born in August.

FMCS: Tell us a little about yourself and where you are currently living!

I am 32 years old, French, living in Tours for 6 months now. This is a city nearby the Loire Valley, known as "the Garden of France". It was the favorite residence of Kings of France during the Renaissance period. They made this peaceful countryside the setting for their dreams.

Thus was born the Renaissance in France. The kings surrounded themselves with the greatest artists and architects of this era. This is the "country of thousand castles". English people really enjoy this area. Da Vinci Code and stuff you know…

FMCS: Firstly thanks for getting in-touch how did you find out about our site?

Just surfing from link to link I suppose, with a big thirst of curiosity as usual. This is all about appetite of the mind. I really enjoy seeing all these DIY addicts seriously doing their things for pleasure only. Taking things into our own hands is still the best thing we can do. Make your zine, build your ramp, draw your clothes, start your band, set up your business. Everybody must do that for sanity of spirit.

FMCS: Tell us a little bit about ’skate-site.com’ and how this site began?

Ten years ago, I broke my ankle for the first time. That’s when I got into photography, and I now use the medium as an extension to skateboarding.

In shooting the pictures, I was keeping the feelings of skateboarding. But I rapidly got more interested by the environment of skateboarding, than skateboarding action itself. This always has been the way I skated: architecture and urbanism as a playground.

I was really into Surrealism and Dadaism at this time, and I saw some likeness between these thoughts / art forms and skateboarding. I wrote some essays on those things and send my work to French skate magazines. But they were only into brands, shoes, pros and hype at the time. So I decided to get the things by myself and publish my work by the most efficient, easier and cheaper way: using the internet.

I was starting to take photos of skate-spots at this time, with no action, and no one in the frame. Just a bench, a ledge, or a desolated area… whatever reminds me skateboard terrain. And just before leaving the spot, I used to bomb “skate-site” on the floor. A reminiscence of René Magritte style, which has been heavily utilized now by the skateboard industry. You know the “This is something” maxim. So the name came from those days. And it works well for the net too. So it became skate-site.com.

FMCS: Where do you get all the collection from? From when you were a kid, Friends… people send you stuff?

When I was writing this essay ‘The Art of Movement”, I was trying to get some documents on the library, then I found this old book dated from 1978 about skateboarding trick tips. I loved the design, pictures and typography of the book. And it was purely skateboarding enclosed in a time capsule.
Since this day, I started looking for all skateboard related stuff from the past, it was like a quest and I found some treasures. First on flea markets, then in vintage records shops then finally with some others dealers on the net.

Now I know what has existed before. From weird, strange 45 rpm to common “How to” books. The most difficult part is to find that kind of stuff 20, 30, or 40 years later, in good shape.
Skateboarding has known a real buzz in the mid 1960’s, and late 1970’s. So many things have been released around this time. Some very interesting things like this jazz album from Joe Farrell “Skateboard Park” who demonstrated for the first time the similarities between the expression of jazz and skateboarding, and then on the other hand some really silly stuff like this 45rpm by this French humorist Patrick Topaloff.

Since 1998, with the revival of skateboarding at its peak, a lot of books have been released. Today some publishers send me their new releases, some don’t. I just try to be the gatekeeper of skate-culture, in order to transmit to the next generation the history of skateboarding. Which is not starting with a Tony Hawk video game!

Without this cultural past, skateboarding would be dead today. It has been, marketed, co-opted, and labeled “Extreme Sport” by the mainstream to be digested by the masses. Malcom Mc Laren has said in 1987 : “Skateboarders are the only rebels left”. It seems not to be true anymore.

FMCS: Does the collection of memorabilia keep growing? And do you update the site regularly?

I’m digging more and more deeply into the memorabilia. I try to update the site every month now. I still find some nice secret pieces of history. I got my gang of gravediggers.
Lately someone send me a word about this X-rated movie from the 1970’s, with nude girls delivering pizzas on skateboards…This is the fun part of leading skate-site.com. I have a lot of feedback. Lately I got some congratulations from Skip Engblom (the boss from Santa Monica Airlines skateboards), Corky Carroll, Tommy Guerrero, Geoff McFetridge, Andy Howell (I’m still waiting for your book mate !) and so on…

New stuff is easy to get, but some of the old items cost me an arm and a leg sometimes, like this original soundtrack from the Hal Jepsen’s documentary “Go For It”. Untraceable, I was looking for it for 5 years…but this is great stuff, Dennis Dragon’s sound…. It’s just a question of time. We have to be patient. It all ends up arriving.

FMCS: Are you skating yourself? And if so, for how long?

I skated more than the half of my life. I started in 1986-87 with an old board from the 1970’s found somewhere. I cracked it learning ollies, on the sidewalk, in front of my door. Then I got a used Natas Kaupas, my beloved Blacktop one. My first real board. I was thirteen I think, and was very impressed by the graphic and the name. I’m 32 now. I take my board sometimes, cruising around… But my ankles are made of crystal now.

FMCS: What’s your preference street or ramp or both? And what’s the skate scene like near you?

I always preferred street skating. This is where I started. We used to skate all day long with my gang back in the day, just going from spot to spot. But one day we had to move from the city to live in the countryside with my mom and little brother.

So every week end I was taking my bicycle, riding 20 kilometers to reach the city and skate all afternoon. Then 20 kilometers more to go back home, and sometimes after that I skated my garage at night. I was a kind of athlete at this time. I had the best ollie in town due to bicycle.

However there was no skate parks back in the 1980’s. So we were basically oriented to the street. Now the revival of concrete skateparks is a great thing. I was dreamin’ of all these concrete waves in my teenage. I saw these huge skateparks in some American TV shows like “Chips” when I was a child. It was unbelievable to see. I think it was Del Mar in the serie. We had a few parks like these in France, some relics of the 70’s. But very “sketchy” to skate.

Now the scene is a whole different thing. I don’t skate too much with the young guns. But we have a great scene here for sure. Most of the best skateboarders in the world are European right now. But here in France we still associate skateboarding with the American dream. That’s why US industry is so strong and very influent on European minds.

I think we can really create something different here, but instead we try to follow the American path. However, some really try to do something else here, like Mekanism for example, which associate their board production to European contemporary artists. No team, no video, no ads in magazines… Just doing skateboards as pieces of art. I like that kind of evolution. That was what I wanted to do with the www.skate-site.com project. Something else that hasn’t been done before. Every body should re-invent skateboarding. This is the only way to give it new directions.

FMCS: We really love your photography! Do you do this professionally now?

I don’t consider myself as a professional photographer. I learn & experiment everyday. I just take photos the way I want to see things. I can shoot photos, I can write stories, I can do some interviews, so I have contributed to some magazines recently, like Modart, Freestyler, Blackpool, Staf, Adrenalin… and I used to be a journalist some years ago for an online newspaper. I have a degree in publishing, but never worked as an editor, except on my website. I’ve approached photography like I did with skateboarding. I try to keep it spontaneous, creative and joyful.

FMCS: Aside from your skill with composition. We also love the clarity of light and strong colors in your photography. Please tell us what you search for in the perfect photograph?

The better way is to keep it simple. I use very simple vintage cameras, from Holga to Hasselbad. A speed, an aperture, and a feeling, that’s all we need to take nice photos. I use film only. I love the magic of photography, when playing with emulsions, sensibility, processing… The most I love are the defaults. For me, a nice photography is a photo with a beautiful accident inside. This is what is called in photography the “Serendip effect”. A simple ray of light can turn your photo on a whole different perception. Some of the shots I like the most won’t be my favorites if it has not been hurt by a happy accident. I love to get a surprise in my photography.

However, the environment and the landscape are my first choice to shoot some action, then movement and style, and after that the model itself. I’m not specially looking for shooting pros. I like rookies. I’m a rookie for 32 years.

FMCS: Do you prepare for any of your photographs to get the right shots! Or is it 99% based on luck?

There’s two ways for me to get some photos. Instant photography, when I’m like a cowboy shooting first to not get killed, and the other is some heavy tripods, flashes, light meter installation to control everything in the frame. Basically you have to initiate luck to get satisfied.

FMCS: Do you exhibit? And will you be doing so in the near future?
Since the beginning, skateboarders and artists coming from skate-culture didn’t care about the good opinion of others. They were keeping their work secret. They didn’t hope for public or official recognition, and had not been culturally indoctrinated or socially conditioned.

Being a skateboarder, as well as being a musician, writer, actor or painter… is to make the choice of living on the fringe of society. Working outside that fine art "system" (schools, galleries, museums and so on), people involved in skateboarding and skate-culture have produced, from the depths of their own personalities and for themselves and no one else, works of outstanding originality in concept, subject and techniques. They are works which owe nothing to tradition or fashion.

But now with the super speed highways of information it’s a whole different thing. Everybody can show his work worldwide by using the internet. And skate-culture has been finally recognized, because of those who were involved in these cultures 20 years ago and have now reached power and authority in making money from that.
So I never think to exhibit my work other than the net. But I’ve been called for an exhibition in Firenze in Italy recently. One of the curators wanted to show my photographs and the collection from skate-site.com.

I think she just dropped on the site when looking after skate-culture stuff. The show is called ‘Human Game’, and it will hit Europe and USA this year. But finally I just got some photos in their exhibition book. I think they didn’t want to pay for that. That’s the dark side of recognition I think. Many businesses want to use the iconography of skate-culture, but they don’t want to pay for it, cause they don’t really give a fuck about this movement. They are just pretending to. At the end of the day it’s just marketing finally.

FMCS: Thanks for the short interview any shout outs?

Thanks a lot to those who support and appreciate skate-site.com which is also made to support them. Anyone can contribute and get a review in sending their books, records, magazines and projects… to my address: Thanks all !

YOANN CIMIER / SKATE-SITE.COM
7 BIS RUE DE LUCÉ
37000 TOURS
FRANCE
yoann@skate-site.com

Site: www.skate-site.com

FMCS: Take care man!

Merci beaucoup. Keep feeding coolshit!

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