Marc McKee's 25 Favorite Skateboard Graphics

Image via Complex Original

Brand: Powell Peralta
Artist: V. Courtlandt Johnson
Year: 1980

The upwards perspective on the skull is what takes this graphic from being just another skull and bones graphic to something that's totally inspired and truly epic. I did a parody of this graphic where the sword was replaced by a banana-it still makes me laugh, but there's no denying the power of the original.

Brand: Zorlac
Artist: Pushead
Year: 1983

The cow skull theme relates to John Gibson being from Texas, even though I didn't really catch that when I first saw this graphic back when I was in middle school. I just thought it looked totally mysterious and evil.

Brand: Santa Cruz
Artist: Jim Phillips
Year: 1984-1988

It was sick how with this series the graphic got more and more insanely detailed with each board. It also laid the groundwork on how graphics could tell a story over time where you would be dying to see what came out next.

Brand: Dog Town
Artist: Wes Humpston
Year: 1978

The Dog Town cross, with its gang-related connotations, helped establish skateboarding as something that was and will hopefully forever remain outside of the mainstream.

Brand: Santa Cruz
Artist: Jim Phillips
Year: 1988

Another great Jim Phillips graphic.

Brand: Real
Artist: Natas Kaupas and Kevin Ancell
Year: 1990

The graphic speaks for itself.

Brand: Blind
Artist: Mark Gonzales
Year: 1991

I really wish I had gotten one of these boards when they came out. For this extremely limited series, Mark hand-painted a limited run of 100 totally different board graphics, making each one a completely separate and unique work of art.

Brand: 101
Artist: Sean Cliver
Year: 1992

Is it sad that racist mass murderer has become a joke, or is it hilarious? I guess tragedy + time = comedy.

Brand: Chocolate
Artist: Evan Hecox
Year: 1997

This is the first time I can think of when all the boards in a series fit together to form a larger scene. Evan Hecox's freehand drawing style is also one of my favorites.

Brand: Bitch
Artist: Sal Rocco and John Thomas
Year: 1993

Bitch skateboards was the brainchild of Steve Rocco's youngest brother Sal, created in response to when all of World's riders suddenly quit to start Girl. I think it's the only time in skateboarding when a company logo also served as an actual death threat. When it came out I thought it was too much and that a line had been crossed, but now that it's almost 20 years later I think it's pretty funny to look back on the insanity of it.

Brand: Blind
Artist: Sean Cliver
Year:

This was the first graphic that Cliver did when he came over to work for Rocco after being fired from Powell Peralta. Actually he designed the graphic while still at Powell, and then when he came to work at World the first thing Rocco had him do was to redraw it so he could release it as a series for Blind and beat Powell to the punch. Not the most ethical thing to do, but that was the fun of it.

Brand: Blind
Artist: Sean Cliver
Year: 1992

Another slick bottom graphic from the "90s. For this graphic the slick bottom had an airbrush painting of the robot from the Terminator with a drawing of Arnold Schwarzenegger slick-screened on top of it. The idea was that when the board got used the image of Arnold would be worn off to reveal the Terminator graphic underneath.

Brand: Powell Peralta
Artist: V. Courtlandt Johnson
Year: 1985

There's kind of an unwritten rule that it's generally a bad idea to show a picture of someone skateboarding on a board graphic. This graphic is the exception to that rule.

Brand: Blind
Artist: Sean Cliver
Year: 1992

"Mr. Butts" was a character taken straight from Doonesbury. If that were all there was to this graphic it would just be one more of a long line of rip-off graphics and it probably wouldn't make it on this list. The thing about this graphic though that was so great was that every board came with a free "smoker's starter kit" which included a match and one free cigarette.

Brand: World Industries
Artist: Sean Cliver
Year: 1992

This was one of four graphics in this series we did for World Industries that featured portraits of Rocco in various sarcastically grandiose settings. In this graphic Rocco is shown standing on top of a crushed and broken Powell logo. The idea was adapted from this book I had on communist propaganda art that had a photo on the cover of a statue of a Russian soldier standing on top of a broken swastika.

Brand: Santa Cruz
Artist: Jim Phillips
Year: 1989

Another great graphic from Jim Phillips.

Brand: 101
Artist: Sean Cliver
Year: 1992

This one was inspired by a low budget horror movie called "The Driller Killer". The flower wallpaper is a nice contrast to the bloody power tool. I also really like the stray hairs caught in the drill bit. They seem to indicate that someone has just gotten their head drilled in.

Brand: Blind
Artist: Mark Gonzales
Year: 1991

The speech bubble coming from the baby says "I've been aborted."

Brand: Lucero (Prime Time Distribution)
Artist: John Lucero
Year: 1988

This graphic is so fucking simple, but with just the red cross and the backwards lettering it says so much. As a kid I always thought the backwards writing on the front of ambulances was so cool, and to see that on a graphic immediately brings to mind all the inherent risks and dangers that are part of skating. Plus it's even more awesome when the rider does his own graphics.

Brand: Sims
Artist: Bernie Tostenson
Year: 1982

Bernie Tostenson was one of the most versatile artists to ever do skate graphics. He did everything from intricately drawn pen and ink illustrations to super strong and bold iconic graphic designs like this. This graphic fit Hosoi's high-flying skate style perfectly.

Brand: Santa Cruz
Artist: Jim Phillips
Year: 1985

Jim Phillips is probably my favorite skateboard artist of all time. This graphic had some really great personal touches that captured various aspects of Ray Meyer's personality-like how he would eat Skippy peanut butter straight from the jar, and how he held down a day job as a computer programmer. It all totally goes along with the stereotype of the nerdy pro freestyle skater.

Brand: 101
Artist: Andy Jenkins
Year: 1992

I think this one was painted with watercolors. That was the great thing about the slick bottom boards of the '90s-the way they were printed allowed artists to use different mediums like painting and even photography, which really opened up the type of graphics you could have. This is also one of those graphics that totally fits the skater since Markovich was one of those guys that always skated fast.

Brand: Alien Workshop
Artist: Mike Hill
Year: 1994

It's such a simple icon, but it worked to give Alien one of the tightest and most symbolic brand identities ever in skateboarding.

Brand: Baker
Artist: ??
Year: 2003

A great example of how a graphic series can work together as a whole and also show the individual personalities of all the different team riders at the same time. Plus the strip club thing.

Brand: Santa Monica Airlines
Artist: Natas Kaupas and Kevin Marburg
Year: 1990

A lot of people may have thought this graphic was about drugs, but I read somewhere Julien Stranger saying that the meaning of it was how skating was like a natural high.