Pegasus Post: April 04, 2017

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Tuesday April 4 2017 9
the positives of New Brighton
Can you tell me a bit about
your family?
I met my wife Joy on a surfing
trip to Westport when I was
16. She was visiting from Wellington.
We’ve been married over
40 years now. She doesn’t surf
though. She still finds it hard to
tell me how big the surf is when
she comes back from walking the
dog. I’ve got a son and daughter,
twins. Sophie lives about 500m
away. She’s a teacher at Waitakiri
School and does a bit of stand-up
paddleboarding. My son Sam
lives down the road from us, he’s
a very good painter and artist.
He does all the design work for
the festival so we’re lucky to have
him. He rides a Malibu board.
What first attracted you to
surfing?
My brother started surfing the
year before. I’d been a competitive
swimmer and it was just one of
those sports that really caught my
imagination. It’s been my whole
life really, apart from my career.
You wore school jerseys with
the sleeves cut off. Not very
glamorous
No, it was seen as a rebel-type
sport and frowned upon and that
was one of the things we liked
about it; we could be within the
mainstream but outside it as far
as the sport that we followed.
SMOOTH OPERATOR: Warren
Hawke rides a wave off
Mangamaunu,Kaikoura, in 1970.
Now it’s becoming accepted more
and more as a mainstream sport
and something that families do
together, which also has its pluses
and minuses – the surf breaks get
more and more crowded.
Have you always lived in
Christchurch?
Yes, except for my first year
teaching we spent in Westport
and we went there for the mild
winters and the good surf.
How long did you teach for?
I taught for 20 years, mostly at
schools in the eastern suburbs,
South Brighton, Burwood,
Belfast. Then I was a principal
for 20 years, at Governor’s Bay
School. People are surprised that
I’d drive there but it was only 25
minutes from Brighton through
the Lyttelton Tunnel.
You wrote a book about
your life as a surfer – NZSurf -
Captured by a Surf Lens. What
made you want to write a book?
I’ve been a surf photographer
for 40 years and contributed to
magazines around New Zealand
and overseas, books and things
like that and I really wanted to do
something that was a reflection
of me and what it was like in the
60s. Also the fact that I had control
over what went in the book
rather than an editor saying: ‘We
want this, this and this.’ I wanted
to do that myself.
It must be a great feeling to
have produced something like
that.
Absolutely, the feedback has
been amazing and it’s been reviewed
internationally. It’s something
I got a lot of pleasure out of
and it’s still selling. I’m working
on another one now so that
gives me some more direction
in life. It’s going to be called The
Collection. It’ll be a series of surf
shoots on particular breaks and
about people who are involved in
surfing, artists and people that
have made surfing their way of
life, young people getting in to
surfing and coming through, as
well as some of the top surfers in
New Zealand.
What’s the wildest thing
you’ve photographed?
Surfing-wise, probably a reef
break down in the Catlins, off the
back of a jet ski in heavy waves
but being able to sit in a channel
and shoot it quite safely. Really
heavy waves, surfers getting
bounced off the bottom, and 3m
waves coming through.
Sounds like it could be addictive.
It is addictive, yes for sure, everything
about surfing’s addictive,
and therapeutic too.
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