Ford Archbold Makes Art
You know Ford Archbold.
A son of high-performance surfing royalty and a former child star himself, Ford’s one of our favourite eccentric, counter-culture regulars. He was one of the three slobs, alongside Kyle Kennelly and Andrew Doheny of peak blog-era surfing’s 3 Slobs project. He was also a member of several successful bands, including Tomorrow’s Tulips, which he played in with his pal Alex Knost. More recently, he’s also been heading up his brand, Spun Spirit, creating lines of clothes that celebrate all his creative endeavors, successes, and quirks at once. Yes, you know Ford. And you love all the lanky extremities, tunes, and that style that’s a little Mercedes and a lot of Mystery Machine.
What you probably didn’t know, though, is that Ford’s been spending the last five or so years deeply immersing himself in painting, screen printing, and drawing. He has his own studio space now, and some of his pieces are being shown off. We’d say his style is a little Peter Lanyon with a sprinkle of Karl Weshke, but we actually won’t because Ford, one, doesn’t want to be compared and, two, shouldn’t be because his art is so uniquely Ford.
He recently had a showing in the gallery space at Daydream Surf Shop in Costa Mesa, California, so we decided to call him up and chat with him all about it. We also talked about inspirations, creative flow, and why the best creative process is not having a creative process.
Ford! What’s going on?
Oh, nothing much. I’m at the warehouse, working. Just getting things done.
Doing a bit of painting or making some new threads?
Yeah, I was just screen-printing some new stuff. Or, actually making the screen and to get it ready for the screen printing while doing a bunch of other stuff.
Nice! Is this for a new, specific collection, or are you just messing around and seeing what lands?
Yeah, I mean just little things to put online and sell. I always enjoy making new stuff, so I’m always doing this.
Nice, so tell me a bit about the paintings you have on display right now. Is it a more formalized collection with an overriding theme or story, or is it just a highlight roundup of the latest and greatest?
So I did one installation that was all paintings made from glass. All smaller pieces. Then I switched that out actually and made it more of a Spun Spirit installation that was screen painting alongside some more paintings and some clothing pieces too. But it’s kind of set up how I would lay stuff around my studio.
Do you have a preference in mediums? Like, do you prefer working with the screen-printing and clothing over painting or vice versa? Or do you try to keep a conscious balance between the two?
I kind of just, honestly, skew whatever I’m feeling that day. And, you know, I’ll try to do both on the same day a lot of times, too. I’ll paint a little, then print a little, and then ship some orders and run around and keep it balanced while doing everything. It’s all my time. All day, every day.
While getting some surfing in too, I’m sure.
Yeah, yeah. And then surfing of course. But I’ve been taking long breaks on surfing lately. I’ll get super focused on art or something else, whatever I’m getting in on at the moment, and I’ll honestly just forget. Or I’ll just feel like I’m rushed. Maybe I’m working on a project I want to finish, and I kind of want to get it done and turn my attention towards that. Also, in the colder months here, it’s a little less appeasing, to be honest (laughs).
I mean, I’m always up super early but I’ll start working or something else. But then I’ll get into phases and going every morning and getting a good routine out of it, like in the summer. It’s just like riding a bike.
And I’m not at the point of, like, where I’m trying to progress so much anymore like when I was younger. It’s more for fun, you know?
As someone who has not been in the water for almost five weeks now because of the sketchy post-fires water quality and just work getting overwhelming, yeah, I feel that and I feel like an absolute fraud. Anyway, so with Spun Spirit and all your painting, you’ve been going at all that for, is it eight years now?
Yeah. I mean, I’ve only been painting for like three to four years. But I’ve been doing Spun Spirit for about seven years.
And it’s been the full-time thing for you this whole time, no?
For the first couple of years, it was mellow, more of a side project. Because I was learning how to do everything from scratch, like the screen printing and making all the screens. And so it was like I started as I was learning. So, that was all part of the process.
And then did the painting come about as a bit of natural, artistic progression?
Yeah, I got a warehouse in Costa Mesa and just had this big space, so I figured I might as well start painting.
Did you ever do much painting before?
No, I didn’t. I mean, I would mess around and draw little art on the side, but just like a collage here and there or whatever.
Oh wow, so notebook doodles to front and center in the gallery like that! Epic.
Yeah, never done full-blown painting or drawing even before. I had a friend, like an older friend, who’s a local here and has been painting forever, and he got me into painting. And that was just one of those, “Oh! You should try painting now,” type of things. But he knew about art, so he showed me artists and inspirations, and I got super into researching art and always checking out new painters or new painters to me and diving into the history of it. I was super obsessed with that. And that’s sort of how I learned, just by checking out a lot of different artists on my own.
Wow, so some self-taught, real Rousseau hours.
Yeah, for sure. And then I found little avenues of inspiration, and it always changed and such.
Were there any artists or inspirations you really gravitated towards initially?
When I first started, I was super into Francis Bacon. I feel like everyone is into Francis Bacon when they start off. He’s the most raw and still has that traditional sense while keeping it out of the box, and all his pieces are super captivating. But, as time goes on, there are so many artists out there. It’s always changing, and you’re always finding new inspirations and different styles.
I don’t actually look at art as much now because I kind of get lost in my head too much. It’d be in there too, subconsciously or something, and then your pieces start looking like someone else’s. So, now I don’t look at it as much and try to stay in my own little bubble.
Because, yeah, it happens. You won’t even mean to, but your subconscious picks it up, and then you’ll see a piece and it’ll be, like, “Oh! It’s like that guy!” And the more you learn about it too it kind of gets in your head. You’ll be, like, “Fuck! Every piece looks like this guy and that looks like this guy.” So, I stopped really looking at a lot of other art, so I don’t have that problem anymore.
So, for each of these collections, like the recent Daydream one, are you curating something with an underlying theme considering the space or what’s going through our mind during that process?
I’m super unorganized. I don’t think about it at all. I kind of just thrash around the studio, but it’ll naturally come. I work on a lot of pieces at once. I’ll be working on up to ten pieces at once, and they’re all around. Whether they’re little paper pieces to bigger pieces to smaller canvases and I’ll take some that are, you know, the same colour palette or something similar so it all makes sense together, in a way.
Do you reckon jumping between so many pieces like that keeps you from having the horse blinders on and getting super lost in your head about things?
That’s the goal, for sure. I don’t want to ever be predictable, or I don’t want to think about it too much. So, I like to be surprised by the pieces, and I like accidents a lot and unintentional stuff that would never happen if you overthought it. I’ve sort of formed my own process through the chaos.
A process of not having a process.
Yeah, and it’s sort of letting yourself do certain things on purpose and giving yourself little guidelines mentally to not be predictable.
What does your dream commission, space, or project look like then? Is there even something specific?
Honestly, I don’t even think about that at all. I’m just down for whatever comes my way, you know? I enjoy doing it, so any way that I can keep that going is good. I enjoy the process, that’s just it.
And what’s the greater art scene in Newport and Costa Mesa like these days?
It’s cool. There are quite a few artists over here. I’m actually sharing a warehouse with Jesse Guglielmana, and then Alex Knost runs the front, little gallery in the same space.
Sounds like a productive, creative environment.
Yeah, for sure. It’s fun, I never leave. I never go out or leave the studio (laughs).
Love it, thanks for chatting Ford and stoked to see your next batch of work!