The Wave

One often encounters waves in windsport images — in most photographs of course — but some of the oddest waves that one encounters are returned in Google Image searches as mere graphic fragments, such as "overlap-wave-right.gif". This particular GIF being an abstract gray swish that appears as a decorative element in the upper right border of the RipNSix water sport apparel company website. The GIF's mate, another wave-like form, one that suggests a pair of dolphins performing flips, appears in the left column.

In watersport art generally, waves are a recurring theme, and the quintessential wave is the okinami that dwarfs Mt. Fuji and threatens to swamp small boats in its thrall, depicted by Hokusai in his 1831 print, "The Great Wave off Kanagawa". This dramatic composition is a far cry from "overlap-wave-right.gif". Incidentally, the Hokusai print reproduced here, in Off Board Transitions, is public domain clip art, courtesy of WP Clipart.



It takes time to develop such an image. Critics trace Hokusai's wave back to an earlier print of cargo boats struggling against the shoulders of a mammoth rise of sea water. One can only imagine that Hokusai's wave might have begun as a monochrome fragment like "overlap-wave-right.gif".

Today, some such as Global Ocean Surf Links, are content to quote Hokusai. Others paraphrase, as did Alan Green when he simplified Hokusai's print to a red crest overtopping a red triangle and made this the logo of his company, the board-sport apparel and equipment manufacturer, Quicksilver. An even more abbreviated wave brands Liquid Force kites and boards.

Envisioning a fantastic tubular wave, Japan-based artist Zichi developed the theme in a novel way. The image unfortunately is no longer accessible through Zichi's blog. To view a thumbnail, and this is well worth the effort, try the Google Image Search: "Zichi Hokusai surf". You should get this link.

Still others not only re-visualize but encourage others to venture beyond the breakers. Such is eHow, which presents an arresting image of marine motion, together with a tutorial on how to create one's own vision of surge.

A sensitive designer need not employ literal depiction, but can evoke a subject through suggestive finesse. And this is what one designer at Honolua managed by distilling the presence of ocean from a mere photograph of coiled wood shavings on blue board.

By now it may be obvious that this blog post has strayed from windsport art. Maybe because the individual wave itself is more germane to surfing than to windsports, or maybe because surfing has been around longer and has therefore had more time to evolve its art, the image of the wave seems better developed in surfing art than in windsport art. At any rate, I have not yet found anything in windsport art that flaunts absurd elan in the manner of the pair of surfing cartoons found on Sipsearch and Red Bubble. In both, a surfer rides atop a reincarnation of Hokusai's wave: in the first as an Edo period figure in kimono, in the second as a manga style infant in diaper.

It seems that even those with terrestrial pursuits pay homage to the wave. Cory Oberndorfer, known for roller skating art, realized Hokusai's wave as a pink mural for blogger HooGrrl.

And artist Cheryl Daniels created a pulsating blue tidal wave design for the skateboard, that denizen of concrete, typically emblazoned with skulls and graffiti. Daniels' digital design, viewable at Zazzle will reward the visit.

And what will be the future of wave imaging? Perhaps false-color maps of meteorological computations like the map of swells on the Surfline Forecast page.

For windsport art, maybe the reason that the wave is not more pervasive is that the focus of windsports is not the wave elusive but the wind invisible.