The
Quantum Reality
of Skateboarding
FEATURING “ATTENTION, FRAGILE!”
BY SARAH ANDELMAN AT SOTHEBY’S Paris
Photography: Kerrin Smith
Soundtrack: Victory Lap by Nipsey Hussle
Paris 8 & lower manhattan
There’s a skatepark nestled in the corner of Tompkins Square Park, framed by Avenue A and East 10th Street. With basketball hoops on one end and ramps and rails dotted all the way down to the other, it’s a kind of perfect New York scene–especially in the evening when the sky does all sorts of denim-colored things and the park is full of skaters, becoming its own world of worlds.There are worlds sitting on the benches, worlds orbiting around landing one trick. If you stand along the tall, chainlink fence, you can start to see it all:
There’s a skater-and-cameraman pair trying ten, fifteen, sixteen times to land that trick.
Another one is trying to do the same, sans cameraman. You can watch him get tired–no doubt it takes a lot of abdominal strength and spiritual steel to try again and again and fail again and again.
Stay there long enough and you can start to see who the best skaters are that night; come often enough and you might even start to see the same one twice.
You can start to see patterns of relationships…who knows each other, different friend groups. Friends skate in and out from the Seven-Eleven a block over. Red drinks, brightly colored packaging of things that are probably crunchy or gummy, some water. Sometimes it's past the usual dinner hour, but the sun doesn’t set till 8:30pm or later in the summer.
If you see the world through details, sartorial ones at that, all the better: fat laces in a shoe that didn’t come that way; keys deliberately clipped to particular belt loops, looks that have been carefully put together but remain practical and so that makes them effortless and right.
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Then there’s “The Big Skakepark”–the one underneath the Manhattan Bridge where the subway runs so loud above that you feel the steel beams vibrating in between the bones of your sternum. There, the graffiti runs three stories tall. There’s usually some sort of rap soundtrack coming though between the Brooklyn-bound Q trains overhead, and if you’re ever lucky enough to land there during a skate competition, you’ll never be the same again.
The energy is so strong, I can imagine you either feel stifled or free. I’d often come here when I needed to feel free. When I needed to feel the energy pushing, pulsing through me in a way that’d remind me that there is so much more than the noise in my head. On one of the last nights of a life chapter, I came here, on my way hollering to the Chinatown sky, I’M-FREE-I’M-FREE-I’M-FREE. You can do that kind of thing in New York, and if you commit to a path of self development, you receive gifts like this kind of sentiment reverberating through you so powerfully that it needs to come up and out, out, OUT.
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Interlude
From the TV series, Mr. Robot–Season 2Leon:
You know, back in the age of Enlightenment, mo'f*ckers used chess as a means of self improvement,
'cuz there wasn't no Tony Robbins DVDs back then - this was it. So what you playin' for then?
If there's no who, then what's the what? What's it for?
Elliot:
Existence.
Leon:
Dope, that's some high stakes right there. So what you waitin' on?
Elliot:
What?
Leon:
Do you dream Elliot? You scrapin' so hard like you ain't never asked yourself this before.
I said do you wanna be here right now? And I don't mean like here here, I mean like here in a cosmic sense, bro.
Like, existence could be beautiful, or it could be ugly, but that's on you.
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Earlier that same summer, I’d met a skater who told me about the physics of skateboarding. He had a tattoo above his knee that said No Feet Down, and the conversation with him came as I was becoming curious about my utter obsession with skateboarding. I knew there was something deeper going on–it was more than the magnetism of all the gritty graffiti (a patchwork of New York authenticity and a world onto itself if you know how to move through the cityscape with that lens), or the marvel of watching all the scenes at Tompkins Square Park, where my brain would often go quiet, entering a meditative state of alpha brain waves. It took me all summer to finally understand the fascination.
Skaters “Really Mean It” (a concept expressed in Issue Nº1 of Cool And Thoughtful Magazine). Really Meaning It is when you do something for the primary purpose of genuinely loving it and the secondary effect is that of looking cool (versus the all-too-prevanant vice versa). Not only do skaters Really Mean It, you know they are authentic because they risk it all: you can’t fake skateboarding–your life and bones are on the line. And not only that, skaters risk it all doing something that doesn’t make logical sense to the naked eye.
skateboarding is a perfect system,
invisible and full of nuances that are
the difference between taking flight
and falling flat. It’s full of things
that most people will never see,
but a skater knows.
This idea of a perfect system full of invisible, nonlinear logic that’s the difference between flight and death mirrors my own orientation towards my dreams. Seeing others moving through space in the same way was like coming home–a reminder that I’m not alone. And when they fly, it is tangible proof that anything is possible.
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83 Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré, Paris 8
The essence of a concept shop is to go beyond what’s predictable and to blend domains: art, objects, clothes, food, experiences–all fair game for a concept shop. Different realms that are usually apart come together to create something cohesive, achieving a resonance that you didn’t even know could exist until you’re right in the middle of it and it all makes sense.
In 1997, Sarah Andelman and her mother created Colette, the legendary concept shop that was named for Sarah’s mother (Colette) and that lived at 213 Rue Saint Honoré until 2017. (Discover the full story of Colette in the documentary, Colette Mon Amour).
Twenty-eight years later and a twenty-one minute walk away, Sarah has created a pop up experience at Sotheby's. It's dedicated to skateboarding, but naturally, holds many worlds within it that bring the overarching concept to life: art, skateboards, books, tableware, collectibles all come together in the expo, titled “Attention, Fragile!”
When you exit the elevator on Floor 1 of Sotheby's, you know you’re in the right place when a large pink arrow pops out from the deep mahogany of Sotheby's. You step into the gallery space, the Salon, and it’s full of air and light. To your right is a sky-print skateboard sculpture by artist Andy Picci (made for flying, obviously), and if you follow along the wall running counterclockwise, you’ll bump into a door to the central Sotheby's atrium lined with photographs–all skateboarding. Ramps and curves and the depth that comes with black-and-white film photography fill the space and your mind as you make your way around.
A series of Sotheby’s cases intermediate the space between the Salon and the atrium. The curation feels soulful and impeccable at the same time–it makes you smile: a Birkin with shining hardware sits side-by-side with an original skateboarding publication and finger-sized skateboards with sapphire rings as passengers. It’s all just so well done.
Back inside the Salon other surreal collectibles dot the space, like the set of Pantone Supreme skateboards by artist Ryan McGinness. The walls have panels of collages from the newly released book, Skateboard Culture by Morgan Bouvant and Sébastien Carayol–a history of skateboarding condensed into an elegant coffee table style format, full of pictures by legendary skate photographers.
There’s a table of holiday presents chosen specially for the expo–like the jewelry collaboration between designers Ines Melia and Avgvst Berlin. In synchronicity with Sarah’s most recent endeavor, Just an Idea Books, they’ve created “the Bookmarks Collection,” a necklace series of sterling locks and keys. And there are several tables of glassware from artists such as Helle Mardahl, Agustina Bottoni, and Sophie Lou Jacobsen–each labeled with the reminder: ATTENTION, FRAGILE!
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Two centemeters is the difference between flying and falling–but you’ll never see it and you’ll never know unless one or the other happens. Attention, fragile.
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Learn more about “attention, fragile!”:
IG @sarahandelman & @sothebys
Attention, Fragile! is open at the Sotheby’s Salon located at 83 Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré in Paris from November 28, 2024 through noon on December 20th. It’s enchanting, makes you think, and reminds you that anything is possible.