Why is Dek a disaster?
I was born and raised in the north east of England, in Newcastle Upon Tyne. When punk rock broke in ‘76/77 I was eight years old – and it hit me like a brick. The music, the whole culture grabbed me even at that early age.
As a kid I was always into british comic books like ‘The Beano’ and ‘The Dandy’.
And then about ‘78 the comic 2000AD launched and the comic was just all full of violence! The new characters like Judge Dredd seemed to go along with the music of the time. Their artwork had a big influence on me. Especially Brian Bolland’s, who was an artist on 2000AD drawing Judge Dredd and joined DC later on drawing Batman, The Flash and other characters – and also Jamie Hewlett who created Tank Girl later going on being a founding member of the virtual band ‘Gorillaz’, creating the artwork and animations.
I’ve been drawing since I was a little kid, although I never started taking it seriously until a bit later in life. I’m self taught, never went to art school.
Because of the influence of the comic books from my childhood I’ve always drawn cartoony style characters, especially punk rock-characters and monster style characters. I do some abstract style artwork, too.
That’s just a little insight into the world of DekDisaster.
Hope you enjoy my art as much as I enjoy creating it!
Original or printed?
Most of my artwork is available as originals.
However, if you like my characters, you might also want to see them on a t-shirt, as a poster on your wall or even as a towel for the beach. To make this possible, to give you the choice and to see you happy, I make them available as Print on Demand (POD).
The Skateboards
DekDisaster skateboards are originally painted with AlphaKrylik paint and Molotow or Posca markers on plain boards. Most of my boards are made of 100% 7-ply Canadian maple wood, while others are made of 7-ply northeastern maple, which is softer and exclusively suitable for decoration.
You can buy the original board.
But I make most of my skateboards available as prints. The printed boards are made of Canadian maple, made in Canada and printed on demand in Denver, CO.
– Ask me if you've seen a board on my Instagram or TikTok that's not in the shop yet!