basementizid.kunst.cellar

August 2010:
Pontus Alv and Nils Svensson “In Search of the Miraculous”

Ausstellungsdauer: 14. August bis 04. September 2010

Gefördert von der Stadt Heilbronn, Carhartt, ProtectYourStyle.de, Dubwars, Data 77112 und PlemPlem

Words by: John Dahlquist

It has been five years since Pontus Alv’s film the Strongest of the Strange came out. Even before the premier Pontus had already started filming his next project, which you are about to get a small glimpse of. Hard work behind and in front of the camera, the unconditional love for skateboarding, his scene and the DIY culture is slowly forming into yet another masterpiece signed Pontus Alv.

This time around filming has mostly revolved around Scania, the southern part of Sweden, where Pontus and his friends resides. Since most spots where killed, destroyed and sometimes torn down in the first film a lot of work, man hours and car rides has gone into digging deep into the Scanian hummus to search for and to create new possibilities. No stones have been left unturned and a lot of times they have been pushed together and gotten concrete poured all over them to create new spots and opportunities in a true DIY manner. When most skaters go to Barcelona and other thirteen-spots-to-the-dozen-cities to film their parts in an environment far from their natural habitat Pontus, Johan Linö-Waad and Danijel Todorovic has stayed on their turf to do the most of what is theirs, their hometown Malmö. The aim has been to show that it is possible to make things happen anywhere and that lack of spots breeds creativity. Creativity does not just come across in the skating but also in all the DIY spots that popped up as an effect of Strongest of the Strange and as an alternative to the public parks for the great masses.

During the making of the Strongest Pontus made up with his father’s death through old super 8 tapes and his fathers words of wisdom. The whole film was Pontus’ way of showing his dad that he became the skater and independent adult his dad always pushed him to be. During the making of this film Pontus’s grandfather and grandmother both passed away and therefore this time around Pontus once again deals with life and death and the meaning of it all. This effected the film as it is hard to make a difference between Pontus private life and his work. Most of the time they are so tightly combined it is impossible to see where one ends and the other one starts.

As the film only consists of skaters that have a personal relation to Pontus, his scene and the world he creates through his films, the movie is a time document and a portrait of a scene and perspective of skateboarding signed Pontus Alv with all what that includes. There has been no team, money or contracts to push or force the skaters to deliver. As most videos show a skateboard team put together by contracts this one shows friends skating together fuel only by the drive to push the envelope and the sheer love for their skateboard scene. A scene is never a geographic place but a living organism created by the skaters who get involved and make things happen. As they go along like alchemists, making gold of nothing but some sheets of plywood, bags of concrete and a lot of creativity magic happens. And Pontus has been around to document it with his death lens. These last five years have been spent, without a day lost, on just that – Searching for the Miraculous.
www.insearchofthemiraculous.se

press:
In den Hinterhöfen von Malmö

Heilbronn – Die Industrielandschaft stirbt, und mit ihr sterben Werften und Manufakturen. Menschen gibt es hier, wo die Mauern zerbröseln und die Natur die Welt zurückerobert, kaum mehr. Willkommen in Malmö, Heimat einiger verrückter Skateboarder, die diese Brachlandschaften für sich erobert haben.

Galerist Sergej Vutuc hat zwei Vertreter der westschwedischen Szene, Pontus Alv und Nils Svensson, in seine Galerie Basementizid eingeladen: Bis Anfang September zeigt Vutuc dort eine spannende Foto- und Filmdokumentation der beiden heimlichen Stars des Skateboarder-Milieus. “In Search of the Miraculous” hat Pontus Alv sein zweites Filmprojekt genannt, in dem der Schwede biografische Elemente, Leben und Tod, Glück und Leid, äußerst private Super-8-Filme aus den 70er Jahren mit beeindruckenden Sequenzen seiner fliegenden Skateboard-Kollegen verbindet.

Brettfanatiker Aber wer ist dieser Pontus Alv? Eine Skateboard-Legende: Sein halbes Leben stand er als Profi für allerlei Firmen auf dem Brett, das für ihn die Welt bedeutet, erst in seiner schwedischen Heimat, später in Kalifornien und Frankreich. Bereits als 16-Jähriger wurde er von seinem Vater ins Flugzeug gen Amerika gesetzt. Er sollte gefälligst seinen eigenen Weg gehen. Gleichzeitig entdeckte der heute 30-Jährige, wie so viele Brettfanatiker vor ihm, seine Leidenschaft für die Fotografie und fürs Filmemachen. Heute baut Pontus Alv Skateparks. Nicht warten, selber bauen. Die lahmen Stadtverwaltungen austricksen, das ist sein Ding, verlassene Orte entdecken, aus dem Material der toten Industrielandschaft, etwas Neues bauen: temporäre soziale Skulpturen, Skateparks auf Zeit.

Eins jedoch dürfen Pontus Alv und Nils Svensson, der die Fotodokumentation beisteuert, nicht: An ihren Bauten emotional hängen. Längst haben die Stadtverwaltungen das Spiel durchschaut. Was früher noch zu Zwistigkeiten geführt haben mag, ist heute längst im Mainstream aufgegangen: Die kreative Klasse folgt den Skateboardern auf dem Fuß. Und die ziehen weiter.
Von Michaela Adick

Link: www.stimme.de