Cardiff Surf Sculpture

Over the past few weeks my dad has revisited a time in his life that was a bit challenging he was the artist that sculpted the surf sculpture in Cardiff. Just recently a man made a giant paper mache shark to surround the sculpture which brought up loads of media attention and my dad has been recieving calls left and right seeking his comments on this. So I am writing this post to tell the True story of the Cardiff Surf Sculpture, 3 years ago July 22 my Dad was comissioned to do a sculpture of a surfer for Cardiff/Encinitas. My dad had his artwork in galleries in Encinitas for many years prior to this and talk of a surf monument had been going on for years my dad had always hoped they would consider him for the job. He was always invited to show his art in a surf festival that cardiff held in honor of professional surfer Rob Machado and when talk of a surf sculpture went about they had mentioned it would be a sculpture of Rob Machado. Well the years went on and not more was mentioned about the sculpture. Then a friend of his had told him that the Cardiff Botanical Society were talking once again about a surf sculpture but my dad was disappointed to find out that they were only going to allow local artists to apply for the comission. There wasn't enough applicants so they opened it up to all southern california my dad applied and anxiously awaited the results. My dad had prayed and prayed for God to open this door for him and I remember we had went to a gallery where a man was talking about the comission and one of us quickly spoke up and said that my dad was one of the applicants and the man who was talking about it said oh well I guess they already picked the artist, and since we hadnt heard anything all of us were crushed my dad most of all, but something told me that this couldn't be I tried to encourage my dad by saying that we can't give up hope that man may have been misinformed or maybe they picked the person but hadn't announced it yet even to the person who they picked. I could tell my dad was still bummed this was his dream and he had been doing sculptures of surfers for many years he thought this would be his chance. Well God answered his prayer turns out the artist they picked was him. Well lots went into the process after this there were many donations made to the botanical society to complete this project and the society was going to vote on out of my dad's entire portfolio which sculpture they wanted to use. My dad had been wanting to do a female surfer due to the fact that it has still not yet been done and because since he has two daughters who surf it would be special to promote women's surfing. This however was not the option the society choose. Due to the limited funds the sculpture was not going to include a wave but just the spray of a wave and the pose was voted on by the society. My dad was still very excited even though he was limited on what the sculpture would look like, but he did the best with what he had to work with. The sculpture was going to be of a surfer doing a backside floater but the wave was going to have to be imagined and all that would be in bronze was the surfer and the spray from the water mounted on a stone. My dad designed it beautifully and he used one of mine and my sister's best friends husband for the model his name Kevin Holdber. My dad choose this guy because he was a very humble athlete and knew the guy would be honored to help my dad with this project. After 2 years of hardwork the site was ready and the sculpture was finished ready for instalation. My dad hired a crane to install the piece and when we arrived at the site my dad was a little disappointed because there was a few glitches in the instalation process the way my dad had designed the sculpture it was to sit high on a stone that was slightly tilted to give it that movement of a backside floater, unfortunately whoever installed the stone had cut 4 feet of the stone and leveled off the top where the sculpture was to sit so it changed the look of sculpture completely. My dad was very disappionted that they did not discuss this change with him but he was still so grateful to have been chosen for the job. The day we installed it there were a few people passing by so stoked about and then we were able to see it at night lit up and I don't know of a happier moment in our lives as a family we were so proud of my dad the sculpture looked beautiful. The sculpture was covered and the next day there was unveiling ceremony and about 500 people were there to watch my dad had invited close friends and family as well to be there. We were all so excited for this moment news reporters were there interviewing my dad and Kevin. One of my Dad's biggest dreams had come true. That night a few of us had went to the pizza place near by to celebrate and watch the news, but none of us were prepared for what we were about to see. The news channel had turned this exciting moment into a thing of controversy a small group of surfers were standing near by watching had nothing but negative things to say and instead of showing one of the 500 people who were there that liked the sculpture the news showed instead 3 guys who had negative opinions about the sculpture from that moment on my dad's dream became a nightmare people's comments about the sculpture were so rude and negative it was hard to be excited about the sculpture when article after article came out about the so called controversy. That is why I decided to write this post to encourage my dad because even though the only thing news papers and channels want to focus on is the drama of the "controversy" the truth is that alot of local people love this sculpture and though it gets messed with all the time it's awesome to see a piece of artwork that represents the sport we love on our coast highway. So to you Mashoo I'm still so proud of you.