From Issue 585

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Interview by Zach Harvard

Finless surfing has long been a thing, the early Hawaiians rode Alaia boards, while more recently Derek Hynd popularised the act of taking a somewhat conventional board, pulling out the fins and whirling down the line at J-Bay, somewhere on the cusp of control and chaos.

We also know that Kelly Slater started out as a wave-slider. As a kid growing up in Cocoa Beach Florida, Kelly learned to pull 360’s and mid-face spins on a finless bodyboard. The unhinged childhood helped him to reinvent surfing with a dizzying mix of reverses and rotations.

In the modern age, surfers have turned to the novelty foam crafts and bodyboards to get their friction free fix. Some, like Jordan Rodin, have crafted futuristicl ooking shapes with flatter rockers, gnarly channels and straighter rails to really push the envelope of speed on a wave. 

Enter Cameron (Cam) Scott, otherwise known as NOTNOT, an avid fins-free enthusiast and street artist from Sydney’s eclectic east. Cam boasts over 50 so called ‘things’ in his quiver, from cutdown Soft Tops to his handmade, wooden Alaia and their foam brother the ‘Albacore’. Most recently, Cameron has been working with Softlite on a signature model, combining two of his favourite things, art and finless surfing.

Cam was originally a bodyboarder who roamed in search of reefs and slabs, but with challenging chunks of ocean in short supply it became harder and harder to find joy out of belly sliding two-foot closeouts.

The creative expression Cam finds in his finless wave sliding; aligns with his various, dry hair pursuits which include screen-printing making sunglasses and crafting his own version of the hand-shaped Alaia boards. 

Meanwhile, as an artist, Cam often seeks to wrestle our attention away from the screens and ask questions about the role social media plays in modern day society. His work regularly features on walls and art spaces around the Eastern Beaches and Inner West of Sydney under his alias NOTNOT.

 In 2019, Cam took to the stage at the well known, independently organised public speaking event TEDx, where he spoke about ‘Digital Realities’. In the 15 minute dissertation, one of the more curious subjects he discussed was the ironic reaction to his most celebrated work. The piece, which critiqued Instagram culture, ended up being photographed and posted on the world’s most popular street art Instagram account. 

Over the following pages, Cam discusses his art and what drives him to seek a friction-free fix.

Cam, can we start by explaining what it is you do?

Cameron – I’m Cameron Scott, otherwise known as NOTNOT. I live in Bondi, working casually, selling sunglasses, finless surfing and commercial screen-printing.

Can you describe your art practice, how did you get into the world of street art?

Screen-printing is probably like the main practice. I studied that at Uni and found that you can actually do all kinds of things aside from just printing t-shirts and posters. In terms of conceptual basis, I tend to make things that are affecting me at the time or interesting to me. So, that could be anything from my love for finless surfing or the incredible influence that social media and digital technologies are having over me. Whatever is on my mind really.

Have you got some key influences in your work?

To be honest I actually try not to look at too many other artists because I work at the Museum of Contemporary Art, so I am surrounded by art all day. Standing in galleries, maybe taking in too much of that stuff can kind of conflict with your own trajectory in what you’re doing. So I try to just focus on my own practice rather than anyone else’s.

Your TEDx talk was really interesting, it seems that people have differing responses to your work as it’s focused on such a large thing in today’s life. Can you elaborate a little on the skeleton and clickbait works?

A lot of people take away a morbid interpretation of those skeleton works but it’s actually just a way of representing the core effect of what these digital technologies and social media interactions have on ourselves. A lot of people pass them off as being superficial, but I think they actually tap into innate feelings within us all, and it’s pretty important to be aware of that. If you just consider them all as pretty inconsequential, you can be consumed by them in the long run. I try to draw people’s attention to the core influence that the interactions can have.

The clickbait stuff – I feel weird being an artist and posting content on social media. So I just try to draw attention to the idea of clickbait, although it’s not really a concern in the fourth estate journalism area, it’s developed into more of a mentality in my mind. We are constantly creating this form of social clickbait for each other. And although I do it with specific intentions of self promotion or getting my artworks out there, I can for the most part, see that posting selfies on social media is a weird form of clickbait that encourages people to click on whatever you are casting out into the online ether. It’s how the world functions these days, but I guess the work is trying to draw attention to why they are doing that and why they feel the need to create this kind of social clickbait.

I can imagine working as a street artist in a suburb like Bondi or even a city like Sydney has both challenges and perks.

I love being in Bondi haha! I’ve kinda got a pretty good relationship with the council workers, all of a sudden instead of painting over my stuff they are sort of preserving it these days which is pretty sick on their behalf. It’s a nice melting pot (Bondi) for a suburb that has such a strange mix of super, high energy backpacker/going out vibes, young families and relaxed markets. Plus a nice mix of natural beauty and urban energy. So yeah, I froth it. 

In the Inner West there is a lot of focus on street art, and there is a big community out there, we don’t quite have that here (Bondi). There is the sea wall but that’s pretty closely monitored and is by approval. So when it comes to finding other street artists to bounce off and have a community in the Eastern Suburbs there is not that much… but to be honest that means more space for me! Ha.

How did you actually get into finless surfing, and do you ever ride something a little more high-performance?

I actually grew up on the boog with the sick little community down at Tamarama. But yeah as you get older, grovelling on the bodyboard isn’t quite as fun as it used to be for most people. So finless surfing kind of filled that bit of a void for me and allowed me to stay frothed when the waves weren’t exactly pumping. I went from Tom Wagner’s Albacore, the blue-white-blue board that I fell in love with…and proceeded to snap about 10 of them. Then surfing longer finless boards, or long boogs. Now I have a quiver something stupid, about 50 things. I love chopping up old foamies and seeing the way I can convert it into a nice finless sled. I would have no idea what I would be doing on a shortboard. Often, I get guys asking me in the surf, ‘Ohh how do you go on a thruster?’ And I actually think I would battle really hard, ha.

And what do you enjoy the most?

A combination of all things, obviously you think that fins are made to cut through the water, but without them you can get onto everything so easily. In a pretty populated space like the Eastern Beaches it helps to get a few more. In terms of the style of riding, I love that feeling of being in control and out of control at the same time. Like teetering on the edge of control is such an incredible feeling. Sadly, as you get a bit ‘better’ that feeling of walking the line between disaster and something sick isn’t as rewarding because you realise that you can get a handle on control once you get over that experience hump. But now I like trying to push into zones that some people might not expect to see someone surfing finless, like trying to get pitted and into bigger waves … seeing what little combos you can throw together.

You’ve been on the Softlite boards for a while now, can you tell me about the new signature model you have just put out?

Originally, I was just throwing around a couple of designs and I went with the clickbait work because I thought it worked with the surfing thing as they are little fishy hooks made to go in the water. Softlite actually changed up one of the processes for this board, they used a mould for another board which has some mesh and harder rails, then I sand down the rails a little bit so they become more narrow and can cut into the face of the wave a little more. I am in love with this model now I pretty much surf it more than anything.

Before I knew who you were, I knew about and had seen plenty of the share boards down at North Bondi, how did that come to light?

As I said I love tinkering with old boards or foamies, seeing if I can bring it back to life. Whether it’s the centre fin is busted, and I take it out and turn it into a twinny. Doing that over the years meant I had this ridiculous collection of old foamies that I really loved but I never surf. So, I took one of the really old ones, like the Coolite giant white Styrofoam things and strapped them down to the metal railing next to the beach, wondering how long this would last if I wrote ‘North Bondi Share Board’ on it. And the first one lasted like half a year, it fully like restored my faith in humanity and it was pretty sick. So, ever since then I’ve been bringing down the odd one that I don’t like surfing. I barely even bring a board down anymore, it’s all just people donating this and that and I just write North Bondi share board on it.

From Issue 585

Issue available on stands now or subscribe to read more Tracks premium content