"Pipeline From the Wave" Triptych

“Pipeline Triptych, From the Wave” North Shore, Oahu

By Bill Braden

One advantage of painting the same view a second time is to have a chance to evolve – to try new things from comments and suggestions of previous work.  A common question by surfers of a prior painting the North Shore Community Land Trust commissioned “Pipeline, Pupukea” was: “Where is this surf spot?”  The houses on the shoreline were deleted for that image; the surfers who use the existing houses to line themselves up for positioning themselves properly at the “line up” did not recognize Pipeline.  This time, we included most of the houses, and some other features requested by our clients who commissioned this piece.  They were major contributors to the successful natural preservation of the 1,200 acres ridge shown in this piece.  See the pair of turtles on the right panel, the rainbow in the center panel?  Other innovations include the underwater trench (seen through the wave on the left panel).  The late waterman and Pipeline waterfront resident Jeff Johnson told us about how all lost items would gather in that trench (safely accessible only in flat summer conditions).  Our own variation/ innovation was in depicting our signature reefscape.  The eerily undercut coral formation and caves and tunnels are unique features of Pipeline.  Some have even been anthropomorphized – made into human like forms.  Scariest of Pipeline wipe-out stories are the ones where someone is shoved into one of these caves and can barely find their way out.  The lucky ones live to tell their stories, without exception there is the winter carnage and annual fatalities at this most dangerous spot.  Who are the faces seen in the water coming over our own heads, as we get “Barreled” at Pipeline?