Marc is a skater and artist from California

 

My name’s Marc McKee but a weird thing to think about is that I was adopted when I was 2 months old, so I must have had a different name before that.

 

In 1989 I did my first skate graphic, Mike Vallely’s “Barnyard” board for World Industries.

 

I worked with World until it was sold in 2007. I also did graphics for its other brands Blind Skateboards, 101, Darkstar Skateboards , Cliché and Almost skateboards. In July I switched to just doing freelance.

 

Writing is an interest of mine and from 1992 to 1997 I split my time between board graphics and working as Editor of Big Brother Magazine and Blunt Snowboard Magazine. Things have changed a lot since then.

 

In the 80s and early 90s skateboarding was still looked down on by a lot of people as a delinquent activity. I still have that image of skating in my mind when thinking about graphics—like, “what would I do in order to impress the bad kids?”.

 

When I got started my favourite graphics were from Powell-Peralta, Santa Cruz Skateboards and Zorlac.

 

I’m a little out of touch with what’s going on now, so I still look back on that era for inspiration mainly.

 

Fortunately, by the mid-2000s when World and Blind became completely kid-oriented there were still artists out there like Todd Bratrud and Neckface who were doing stuff that was pretty raw. Seeing their stuff and graphics Sean Cliver had done around that time pushed my graphics in a direction more reminiscent of the 90s.

 

Al Boglio was one of the skaters who was key in making that happen. Our company acquired Cliché around 2007, and Al was their brand manager. It wasn’t long before he had me doing stuff for them inspired by that earlier time.

 

I just finished a graphic for Cliver’s new skate company StrangeLove Skateboards.
It’s drawn as if it were the long-lost fifth graphic in a series of World boards Sean and I did in 1992.

 

The original group of boards was called the “Rocco Tribute Series,” and featured various portrayals of Steve in various grandiose ways. Each board was the first pro model for four of the ams from the Love Child video Daewon Song, Shiloh Greathouse, Chico Brenes and Jovontae Turner.

 

There were plans for Jed Walters to go pro too. That never happened though and Jed pretty much disappeared. Sean caught up with him earlier this year, so now he’ll finally be getting a board.