Skye Walker is a California artist and surfer who is devoted to liv­ing out his dreams. His cre­ations are rich, dynamic paint­ings that are emo­tional, mov­ing, and con­nected to the rhythm of the ocean. Skye shares with us his heroes and his unique perspective.

What was life like grow­ing up?

My par­ents, Morris and Lynn, were enter­tain­ers and they per­formed all over the USA and over­seas (enter­tain­ing the troops in Vietnam) as well as singing and doing com­edy. When my sis­ter, Amoris, and I were old enough, they brought us into the show and we formed a fam­ily band called The Earth Walkers. We per­formed all over the USA for schools and com­mu­nity cen­ters with a mes­sage of sav­ing the envi­ron­ment. I played banjo, dad gui­tar, mom and sis­ter sang and we did a bunch of comedy.

It was a dif­fer­ent upbring­ing for sure, but one I’d never change. We moved around a lot before and after our tours of the States. This made it hard to be
by the ocean all the time, thus mak­ing it hard to surf, but when I could, I cer­tainly would.

Who did you look up to and admire when you were a young man?
I’d say Bruce Lee. I watched a lot of his films grow­ing up and read some of his work and stud­ied mar­tial arts at times. Talk about a guy who
was purely devoted to his pas­sions and dreams, and wasn’t going to let any­one stand in his way! One of my favorite quotes of all time came from Bruce, and it relates to every­thing includ­ing surf­ing: “Empty your mind, be form­less, shapeless—like water. Now you put water into a cup, it becomes the cup. You put water into a bot­tle, it becomes the bot­tle. You put it in a teapot, it becomes the teapot. Water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend.”

When did you get your first surf­board?
I started surf­ing when I was 15, but didn’t get my first board until I was 19 because I was liv­ing in Oregon and didn’t get to go as much as I wanted to. It was an old 9′ 6″ Donald Takayama noserider that was beat up. It broke on an aver­age size day of surf after hav­ing it for a month.

What was the feel­ing you had when you first stood on a surf­board?
I think it’s the feel­ing that every­one gets when they first stand on a board and ride a wave—stoked, com­pletely stoked.

Where did your inter­est in art come from?
My dad did a lot of art and graphic design while I was grow­ing up, but I always drew as a kid at home and in school. Whenever I was bored, or had a pen and paper, I would doodle.

I have boxes and boxes of draw­ings I did when I was a kid. I would sit in my room and just draw. Even in high school, I was per­fectly con­tent with sit­ting in my room with my music on and draw­ing and paint­ing for hours on end. When I was nine years old, I sent a draw­ing to Garfield cre­ator Jim Davis. He wrote me a let­ter back, say­ing “good job” and keep it up. That let­ter inspired me to pur­sue a career and lifestyle as an artist. Of course, I was an impres­sion­able nine year old, but I haven’t lost inter­est in it yet.

What is your process when cre­at­ing your art?
Lately I’ve been work­ing pretty organically—meaning I’ll get an idea, and just go for it with min­i­mal or no sketch­ing … unless it’s a com­mis­sioned piece. Then I will do a detailed sketch first. But it’s been pretty lib­er­at­ing to just paint and draw and see what hap­pens. I’ve been really inter­ested in lots of lay­er­ing and tex­tures under­neath the sub­ject mat­ter. It is appeal­ing to the eye, both close and from a dis­tance. Even if it’s just the pen­cil lines or the start of the paint­ing that I didn’t like and lightly painted over, it cre­ates an inter­est­ing depth to the piece.

This has also led me to not hang onto some­thing that I’ve just painted too tightly; if I don’t really like it, I’ll paint over it. I never used to do that. I would get down on myself for not get­ting it right the first time. Art is all about change—you can always change it and make it better.

Of all the places you have trav­eled to, what place in par­tic­u­lar stands out? And why?
I recently went to Panama on a surf trip, and it was such a lush, beau­ti­ful, trop­i­cal envi­ron­ment. Out in the coun­try is so far removed from the city 
and junk, and it’s just nature. The locals who live out there don’t care about tech­nol­ogy, pop cul­ture or any of the things we are inun­dated with every day. They farm and hang out with their fam­i­lies in a sim­ple, coun­try liv­ing lifestyle. Simple liv­ing equals less stress. I also just went to Big Sur. What a mag­i­cal coast­line that is. I hope it stays that way.

What is it that makes you such a nice per­son? What code do you live by?
My mom always said to live by the Golden Rule—“Do onto oth­ers as you would have them do onto you”—so I try and abide by that. And I try and make peo­ple laugh a lot. There is noth­ing bet­ter than mak­ing peo­ple smile and laugh.

Who or what inspires you?
Nature, surf­ing, music, the female fig­ure, and artists who are doing their own thing and not wor­ry­ing about what oth­ers think.

What is the great­est thing you have learned in your life?
That every­thing hap­pens for a rea­son. And mom was right—eating your veg­gies is good for you!

Do you have any regrets or wish you had done some­thing dif­fer­ently?
That I didn’t invest in energy drinks when they first came out. I’d be rich right now!!

What are you most proud of?
I guess that I’ve always known that I wanted to be (an artist) and I’ve stuck with it. I know a lot of peo­ple who are tal­ented artists or have poten­tial, but they let it slip away so they could get a job or they just didn’t stay focused. I’m not a great artist by any means. I will always strive to be bet­ter. However, I will always be an artist no mat­ter what. I’m also very proud of my family.

What mean­ing does surf­ing hold for you and how has it changed your life?
Surfing is such a per­sonal sport. You don’t need any­one else to do it with, and it’s all about just being in the water glid­ing along and enjoy­ing your­self. You also have to push your­self to become bet­ter, but you do it at your own pace. Surfing is not how it looks to oth­ers. It’s how it feels to you. I have always loved the ocean and, like so many, have been drawn to it. If I’m feel­ing unin­spired, sad, upset or just want to get some waves, it’s right there wait­ing for me no mat­ter what.

What brings you the most hap­pi­ness in the world?
Making oth­ers happy.

Who are some of the peo­ple you feel are shap­ing the path for surf­ing today?
Dang! Tough ques­tion. Off the top of my head, Kelly Slater is still unreal. Dave Rastovich is forg­ing ahead with envi­ron­men­tal endeav­ors and he’s not just being a “pro surfer” and Steve Barolotti is an amaz­ing jour­nal­ist who writes sto­ries that help peo­ple under­stand the sport of surf­ing and its sub­tle qual­i­ties based off his trav­els and expe­ri­ences. To under­stand where the sport is going, you have to look at its past, and Joel Tudor, aside from being an amaz­ing surfer, has always been a big pro­po­nent of under­stand­ing the his­tory of surf­ing and respect­ing it. But there are so many other surfers, shapers, artists and orga­ni­za­tions that are doing so much for the sport. It’s hard to point them all out.

What is in your cur­rent quiver? What is your favorite board? Your favorite surf spot?
Currently I have a 10′ Hobie Vintage long­board, 6′ 6″ Hobie Retro Egg, a 5′ 8″ Hobie Circa 71 fish (cur­rently my favorite board), a 5′ 10″ KG Twinzer that I’ve beat to hell, a cou­ple other fishes and three thrusters. I like to mix it up depend­ing on the con­di­tions, plus it’s fun to ride dif­fer­ent boards.

I have a new 5′ 10″ quad Wood Custom Surfboard on the way. I think this will be my new favorite board. Micah Wood is a tal­ented shaper and has a great future ahead of him. (Check out his boards at: www.woodcustomsurfboards.com.)

 My favorite surf spot is Swamis. But as long as I’m catch­ing some waves and hav­ing fun, that’s all that matters.

What’s your favorite meal?
Dang! Too hard to answer. So much good food out there. Lately I have become a huge fan of a good veg­gie break­fast omelette with a side of toast, but­ter and jam. It’s quite choice.

What are you cur­rently lis­ten­ing to on your iPod?
The Black Keys, Junior Boys, The Black Angels, Stellastar, Band of Horses, Cut Copy, Ray Lamontagne, to name a few.

What causes, projects or orga­ni­za­tions do you sup­port?
Currently I’m work­ing with Pro Peninsula and CERF (Coastal Environmental Rights Foundation). I think it’s really impor­tant to sup­port non-profits that are try­ing to make a dif­fer­ence in, not only the surf world but, the world itself.

What’s next for Skye Walker?
I’m work­ing on some new art and try­ing to fig­ure out where to do the next show. I have to wrap up a cou­ple com­mis­sions for some clients; homes, which is great. I also just started a small t-shirt line called Glide (www.glidecollection.com) with my friend, Mark Connelly. We donate a por­tion of the pro­ceeds to Pro Peninsula, which is ded­i­cated to strength­en­ing indi­vid­ual and com­mu­nity efforts to pro­tect the nat­ural envi­ron­ment through­out the Baja California penin­sula. They are doing great things for the envi­ron­ment down there and this is one way we can help out. We are cur­rently work­ing on some new tees which we hope to have out before the holidays.

And other than that, I’m just blessed to live where I live, be healthy and have amaz­ing friends and fam­ily. Without these peo­ple in my life, I wouldn’t be who I am today.

To learn more about Skye Walker and his art, click here.