Miles Thompson

Miles Thomp­son is a tal­ented Cal­i­for­nia surfer/artist whose paint­ings are a mix­ture of pop cul­ture, island tiki, and sur­re­al­ism. His work is like an end­less stream of con­scious­ness that flows from his mind to his brush. We spoke with Miles to find out what makes him tick.

What was life like grow­ing up?
In ’71, I was born on a Navy base in Pen­sacola, Florida. Four months later, we moved to El Toro at the end of Laguna Canyon Road. I spent time at the beaches in San Clemente, Dana Point, and Laguna.

Huge lines of beef­cake belly rash that lasted all sum­mer from my first gen­er­a­tion Morey Boo­gie at T Street and skim­ming at Strands morn­ing, noon and twi­light. I was a lucky, bespec­ta­cled and blis­tered kid for my first 14 summers.

I liked sponges so much I bused to Salt Creek daily in 8th grade to get tubes on my used Mach 7 and loved the graf­fiti under the bridge there—marveling at aerosol painted waves before the Ritz was even an idea: Anar­chy! Locals Only! No Fat Chicks! Kooks Go Home! I spent a year and half in Aus­tralia and spent months on the Gold Coast, along the reef in between 8th and 9th grade. Syd­ney was amaz­ing. Later, I grad­u­ated high school in Encini­tas while liv­ing in funky Leu­ca­dia, surf­ing Bea­cons daily.

Who did you look up to and admire when you were a young man?
I looked up to the Bionic Man more than any­one for long time. I stuck tight with my boo­gie board­ing, BMX big brother, gath­er­ing the vocab nec­es­sary to trash talk him. I learned to refine my draft­ing skills by watch­ing the pen­cil of my step­fa­ther, who was, and is, an archi­tect. Around the time of high school, I really admired my dad’s wild nature. He took me out on Hobies, Sabots, week­end Catalina jumps galore and jaunt or two on an 8m Cup Run­ner or two.

When did you get your first surf­board?
My first board was a 5’10” chan­nel bot­tom dou­ble fly swal­low tail thruster that I got about a month after I started surf­ing. That was a Tube­line and I loved it like chips. I was 14.

What was the feel­ing you had when you first stood on a surf­board?
A drifty, falling down­stream weight­less­ness was my first real sen­sa­tion as I sur­veyed the water below my feet mov­ing all around over orange sandy eddies. I had dropped into plenty of waves, but this was a whole new per­spec­tive on wavecraft—laughingly sim­i­lar to an elevator’s cord being cut.

Where did you inter­est in art come from?
I just liked the way cer­tain things looked that had a sense of per­son­al­ity, style and indi­vid­ual qual­ity. I always loved good news­pa­per comics with sys­tem­atic black spot­ting, whether or not they were inked with a brush or a pen. When a pen or brush touches paper, it can carry a lot of impact. Rick Grif­fin, printed in stacks of Surfer mags in every garage of my neigh­bor­hood grow­ing up, was God. He can’t be topped … ever. (Sorry Robert.) For car­toon­ing, there was only Mad, ZAP, Play­boy and EC … the best.

What is your process when cre­at­ing your art?
My stuff is now more about the research than it is about the craft and tech­nique. The approach does vary depend­ing on what I want out of the process, and it is always sub­ject to change. Cur­rently, I’m fin­ish­ing a por­trait of Dora this week that I started months ago.

With gouache paint­ing, I try to honor the thumb­nail sketch, but it often evolves as I sit with it and some­times an idea becomes dis­pro­por­tion­ately ambi­tious. I love what I do, so I do it as best I can.

Of all the places you have trav­eled to, what place in par­tic­u­lar stands out? And why?
My bright­est oceanic moment lies in a sin­gle night between the Pacific islands of Hawaii and the real west, about half way out, on a dead calm sea, fer­tile with phos­pho­res­cent micro­jel­lies spread­ing giant gen­tly slow rolling pointed V’s off the bow wake below the pul­pit on a mir­ror that seemed to end at about 50 feet off. I was calmly, cos­mi­cally and stone cold soberly buf­feted by the cot­ton candy of the milky way from hori­zon to hori­zon. Green/white water­bound lights, accom­pa­nied by cor­po­rate satel­lites over­head and per­fect water all around, fused into what seemed was an island. It was peace.

Who or what inspires you?
My 7 year old daugh­ter. Those that are self-possessed, with­out being self-righteous about facts, who elect to man­i­fest their own hon­or­able ver­sion of their history—history inspires! Venus, a girl­friend, music, art, food, sex, tiny nerds with big ideas, cam­eras and writing.

What is the great­est thing you have learned in your life?
That you go now. Patience. And that famil­iar­ity breeds contempt.

What are you most proud of?
My daugh­ter. I’m con­stantly ask­ing the uni­verse, “She’s really mine?”

Who are some of the peo­ple you feel are shap­ing the path for surf­ing today?
Nobody is. The waves are shap­ing the future path of waverid­ing, not surfers or shapers. Nobody is lead­ing surf­ing any­where it hasn’t been already. The ancient surfers went straight so that they could share waves as communion.

What is cur­rently your favorite board? Your favorite surf spot?
By far my favorite board is a 6’6″ Klaus Jones stringer­less “Arc board,” inspired by Este­ban Bojorquez’s surf­boards like all of Klaus’ hulls. Klaus made this board for him­self. Now, it’s mine. I also love my 9′ CC Slider when it’s flat or lulled out—such a fun one

Rin­con is my favorite spot because of the com­mu­nity; it’s less of a has­sle than surf­ing L.A. County.

What’s your favorite meal?
Ahi Tuna Pon­char­train at The Palace Grill in Santa Bar­bara. I just had some seri­ous pump­kin, red pep­per and cashew action—that’s pretty good. Sweet pota­toes and thyme, gin­ger, breads, nuts, beans, salad and cheese. I still eat ani­mals, but am doing it less and less in an effort to curb car­bon impact.

What are you cur­rently lis­ten­ing to on your iPod?
I’ve bought and sold music since junior high. I like her­itage jazz a lot. I like every­thing but punk from Orange County in the ‘70s. I’m not imper­vi­ous to the whimsy of a Moog, a Ther­min or the human voice.

What are you most grate­ful for?
My ex-wife—her life after a year of can­cer treat­ment, her love as a friend. We were 13 years together, so she’s fam­ily and I just love that she’s alive. I’m immune to all shit thanks to entirely to this one natural miracle.

What’s next for Miles Thomp­son?
Pro­mot­ing Ocean aware­ness and Global Fish­ery Management.

In July, I’m tak­ing on a one man show in Leu­ca­dia with an old friend. Plan­ning an art board or two—maybe do some lim­ited edi­tion fins— with por­traits of surf his­tory, such as the Duke, Da Cat, Da Bull, Gree­nough, Lid­dle, etc.

I’m curat­ing a Tiki Ti 50th Anniver­sary event in 2011 and pub­lish­ing a vol­ume of that show as well as pro­duc­ing my own inau­gural ceramic set with Munk­tiki for that event.

I really want to con­tinue my series of Cal­i­for­nia por­traits, and am plan­ning a show a year and a half out with Jim McMil­lan on another por­trait show.

All images cour­tesy Miles Thomp­son. All rights reserved.