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The second edition of the Flotsam surf film and photography festival has kicked off at the Gold Coast this week (May 1 -14). The two week celebration was developed in response to the economic impact that COVID-19 restrictions had on the QLD border region of the southern Gold Coast. Flotsam features an abundance of workshops, exhibitions and flicks for your curiosity and entertainment that are all ocean and surf related. Flotsam want to continue their support for Gold Coast local surf filmmakers and photographic artists, with a long-term goal to provide ongoing opportunities to retain artists in these fields.
Tracks have jumped on board as a supporter of the festival this year, with a few of our long-time collaborators such as Peter ‘Joli’ Wilson and Simon ‘Shagga’ Saffigna hosting exhibitions and workshops. We caught up with Shagga yesterday to talk about what’s happening in this year’s festival. (Which also turned into a brief Superbank surf report)
Tracks: Hey Shagga, how are you?
Shagga: Yeah, good, just ripping into some final edits. Every time I go down the beach I get more clips for this film I’ve got to cap it at one stage haha. We’ve had three weeks of non-stop waves. We’ve had such a good run, you can see it’s kind of dropping today but hopefully, we get some waves for this event, that will be nice. The sand’s still deep. I think they’re just planning on just pumping sand. To keep it going, which is good.
Good to hear. So Flotsam kicked off this week. How’s it going?
Yeah they had the launch thing yesterday. So yeah, it’s all happening. I think Teddy’s ( Ted Grambeau) coming back from Tahiti. Hopefully, he’s got one on tonight at Dust Temple. And then yeah, there’s stuff going on everywhere haha.
Is it true that you were one of the guys behind it?
Yeah. You know, I kind of sit on the board for it with Joli, Caz(Carolyn Emge) and some other crew. It’s trying to do something to showcase all the great talent we have here. You know, all the artists, photographers, videographers and musicians. So Caz came up with the concept as she’d done another one previously called Bleach Festival. But that went down a kind of a different path. So this one, we’re trying to keep it beach culture and surf related. The crew that are involved in it are people who are ocean lovers.
Flotsam kicked off just after COVID? Could you go into a little detail of the origins of the festival?
Yeah, like I said it came from Caz. I’m not sure if you’ve heard of the Bleach Festival, it’s a really big festival, that she started with a friend. But she came to me with the idea of just doing something. Yeah, around that time of just pulling everyone together to do something really cool down this end. I just came off the back of doing a campaign after COVID called ‘Essentially Cooly’ which was to raise awareness of how hard the town was doing it after that period. You know, people were locked out and the businesses were folding and you know, a lot of my friends were in kind of desperate times. So I think off the back of that, Caz has really kicked in and went fuck you know, let’s get the word out there that you know, this place is back and it’s as beautiful as ever.
And last year was a real success, you know for the first year and this year has grown. It’s bigger and better and a lot of crew have stepped up into telling and sharing their story. You know, you got guys like, Dick Hoole involved in it now.
Could you talk a bit about your project ‘Poetry in Motion’ that features Michael Peterson and Joel Parkinson?
My friend did a poem on Michael Peterson (MP) that’s on the plaque there at Kirra. And then Mason Rackband, who his Dad, Billy Rackband, is kind of one of the original Beach Boys here. Mason ended up playing the song of the poem that my friend wrote on MP. So we recorded that and fuck its mind blowing hey. And I just did the film clip for them. The lads from Morning Of The Earth gave us a bit of footage, and I had some other people that have given me some footage that hadn’t really been seen before. And I’m tripping on how it came out.
So yeah, just cool shit, you know what I mean? It’s different to what I see in the kind of the surf grinder culture, you know, what I mean? It’s taking a back step and remembering how we got to where we are and you know, a give people a different kind of concept of what surfing is to them, you know, from back then.
The other facet of what’s included is the Parko poem, which is kind of our celebration of his 10 years since his title win and a bit of a life history including his 99′ J-Bay win, to winning a world title. And that’s a pretty cool film clip too.
Then there’s the stuff I’ve been shooting here the last couple of years, just of everyone coming into town and just the locals and the waves that we’ve had, so ended up doing a little film there. It’s ended up being 45 minutes or so. The waves have just been pumping though, I keep adding to it. Trying to finish it off man, haha…
What are some of the other workshops/exhibitions/films you’re looking forward to at Flotsam?
Joli’s one is epic in my eyes, being able to go and learn off someone like Pete, you know, that’s pretty awesome. And it’s such a wealth of knowledge.
(All participants to Joli’s workshop will receive a 12 month Tracks digital subscription*.Get your tickets in the link below)
But I mean, there’s so many, I’m pretty sure Josh Bystrom has got one, and I saw Dick Hoole around the Pink Hotel there and then you got all these sick walks.
There’s a bunch of girls who have done amazing stuff as well. You know what I mean? Some great films and great photography. Yeah it’s epic and there really is just such a vast variety of what surf culture is to you know, to each different individual person who’s displaying their work. There’s really there’s so much to do over that 14 days, I’m tripping.
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There will be free and ticketed pop up events in Burleigh, Palm Beach, Currumbin, Tugun, Kirra and Coolangatta.. Below are some of the surf- focused events:
5 May: Dean James/ LAYR
6 May: Joli’s Full Day Surf Photography Masterclass
(All participants will receive a 12 month Tracks digital subscription *)
6 May : Flotsam: Poetry In Motion ft Joel Parko & MP
7 May : Art Recycler: Surf Photo Collage Workshop
7 May : Art Recycler: Girls Surf Photo Collage Workshop
7 May: (Surf) Girls On Film
12 May : Flotsam: International Surf Flick Fest
12 May Grajagan – Surfing In The Tiger’s Lair
13 May : Justin Gane: RePulse QLD Premiere + 20th Anniversary of Wanderjahr
Click here for the full schedule or how you can purchase tickets.
