Nils Svensson – Issue 41 Interview

Introduction & Interview by Jono Coote

Photography by Leif Å Svensson, Nils Svensson, Pontus Alv & Danijel Stankovic

There is no clear path by which a city gains a reputation as a skate tourism hotspot. Some cities seem destined for renown by dint of their architectural merits; think Barcelona’s Gaudi-garnished expanses of marble, or New York’s uniquely appealing cellar door aesthetic. Others benefit from their playing host to bastions of industry, San Francisco being the glaring example. Often, however, it is the hard graft of local skaters toiling away behind the scenes which elevates a city to shine brightly in skateboarding’s broader consciousness. Such is the case with Malmö, a place which has thrived in that consciousness since the early 2000s due to the drive of its locals. The fruits of this drive range from the DIY spots which have been cropping up there since the early 2000s, to one of Scandinavia’s most renowned skateparks, to the insane cultural anomaly that is Bryggeriet High School. 

Nils Svensson has been at the forefront of all of the above and more, documenting much of what has taken place over the years through his camera lens. When Phil Evans messaged us regarding his upcoming documentary on Nils’ career, Click Click, it seemed the perfect opportunity to chat with Nils about the film, DIY spots, working with Pontus Alv and the changing skate landscape of a small industrial city on the banks of the Öresund Sound which punches well above its weight in terms of global skateboard recognition – this, of course, being in no small part down to his contributions.

Malmö is a forerunner of the idea of skate friendly spaces and an ethos of skaters working with local authorities to ensure that our voices are listened to. How hard was it to build that relationship initially, and who was involved?

I feel that we set the foundations a very long time ago, and since we built Stapelbäddsparken Skatepark the relationship with Malmö has evolved – we started to organise events, that kind of thing. Before that we were working with the city within the leisure department, amongst different activities and sports. In creating Bryggeriet we set up this platform from which everything else kind of sprung. That was obviously a lot of hard work, and we didn’t know what we were doing – we were just a bunch of skaters that wanted to skate. Here, same as with you guys, it’s tough in the wintertime. You need somewhere inside to skate, so that was our goal. 

Back then skating was really small, Malmö was almost detached from the Swedish skate scene. Everything happened in Stockholm – the magazine, everyone who was sponsored – while we were quite isolated. Nothing happened here, basically, back then Malmö was still this industrial, working town. We had a shipyard back in the day, these heavy industrial things, and that set the tone. There was nothing cultural, nothing really going on, and it was the same with skating really. There weren’t many skaters here and it was hard to convince the city to give us anything.

A turning point was when some of our friends opened up a skate shop called Boards R Us back in the mid 90s, which became this space where you could meet up and connect. The skate shop was doing terribly, but it became a hub and created a community. We started to build a little skate scene. The skateboard association in Malmö, Aggro Cult, had already started a few years earlier, but you know how it is with skaters, they don’t always like to get organised. Then when the shop opened they said that if you became a member you would get some discount there and that really had an effect. Suddenly instead of 10 people we had maybe 100. That was when we gained some kind of momentum here, the public could see there was a skate scene. We had nowhere to skate in the winter so we skated in garages, it attracted more and more people from neighbouring towns and suddenly it became an issue – 30 to 50 people in the garages in the evenings. It created some headlines and the city started to think, we have a group of people here and we have something to solve, they might need somewhere to skate. I was working in the shop and for the association one year when I was in between stuff and needed a job, and my task was to make contact with the city and ask them if they could help find a space… and suddenly there was. We already had the plan, we wanted the indoor skatepark and we wanted it run a certain way. Bjorn, one of the guys running the skate shop, was a skilled builder and so we already had blueprints for the ramps. 

The time was right and we got connected with some key people who were phenomenal at making connections and finding ways to get support and finances from the dusty people at Malmö city. We owe everything to these two, Ronny Hallberg (RIP) and Håkan Larsson. But obviously there wouldn’t be a project without us, the skaters. We didn’t know what we were doing, but we were passionate about it. It was fun, like a big adventure. We just wanted something under a roof, a couple of quarterpipes and a good pyramid in the middle, and instead we built one of the best skateparks in Europe… which was pretty cool, I have to say.

From the ruins of the by-then-gone-bust skate shop, Bryggeriet was created. Bryggeriet has since been the foundation and the roots of the skate scene and its development. Of course there’s many trees in the forest but this one I know inside and out and the effect it has had on its surroundings. There have been a lot of key people on this journey and I’m happy I’m still working at Bryggeriet with many of the OGs like Tobias Henriksson, John Magnusson and John Dahlquist. Shout out to Djura Posse.

You mentioned Stapelbäddsparken as a major turning point, but I guess before that were all the DIYs you started building and now the city is really well known for its DIY scene, of which you’ve been a major part and documented from the beginning. 

Yeah, we started in 2002 with Savanna Side. We were inspired from these trips we’d do through Europe, a bunch of us would rent a motorhome and decide to visit a concrete skatepark we’d read about somewhere – drive to the Basque Country or wherever and just adventure for two weeks, mapping out different concrete parks, which didn’t exist in Sweden. Coming home we’d have all this inspiration, so we started to create our own space. No knowledge whatsoever, just trial and error, super fun.

And that’s definitely important to a scene, having these spots where you all get together, develop something, bounce ideas off each other…

Exactly. That’s the purpose, creating a scene, doing stuff together, socialising, feeling that you’re part of something.

And it’s cool that your DIY spots were influenced by older skateparks, then Stapelbäddsparken definitely has a DIY feel in parts with all the different lines you can hit and the quirky small quarters and stuff. 

John Magnusson, my colleague, was part of all these trips and of building Savanna Side. Early on at Bryggeriet we started with different kinds of education and one of these courses we had was based around creating your own project. He went to this school, and his project was Stapelbäddsparken. He got some really good connections with the city pretty early on. We could see his potential, his dreams, he took it on and as soon as he had finished that he got employed at Bryggeriet. It was good, on those trips through Europe to all these old concrete places, wherever we’d go John would drop in and was just beyond anything else. He’s a true natural, one of the best skaters I’ve ever seen I think.

I remember him having footage in one of Phil Evans’ other projects, I think Lightbox? With regards to DIY spots in Malmö, what have been your favourites to either shoot photos at or skate?

My absolute favourite is Savanna Side, mostly due to the fact that we didn’t know anything. It was so fun and so challenging, this whole thing of learning while you create something. Everyone pulled together to build and skate and film and shoot photos. Its location was very nice as well, it became this area you could just go to and hang out, night or day, and there would always be something going on. Steppe Side took over when Savanna Side was destroyed, that had a similar vibe and was even more central and accessible. With that one, when we moved in it was a part of this homeless community. It was a fenced off area, lots of vegetation, and they had really established themselves there. They had some kind of chief and we had to have a meeting with them round the campfire. There were a lot of characters there, with people living in tents right next to the park the interactions were pretty interesting and fun. They set up a few rules – no skating on a Monday, stuff like that. And that one was around for a long time, so it went through many different stages. But it’s that thing, isn’t it, where the place is never finished – you rebuild, add to it, paint, tear something down because it didn’t work, it constantly takes different shapes and forms. All of them have been really fun, but those early ones were for me the best ones.

You mentioned in your Free interview your fruitful working relationship with Pontus, and have been behind a lot of iconic Polar images over the years. How much does Pontus’ vision help inspire and push what you are doing in your work?

A lot I would say. Our stuff is completely cooperative, mostly that’s how I work with anyone though. I’m not coming in with some kind of vision, it’s a partnership. It’s hard to describe, but I talk about it a bit in the film. We’re creating images together, he’s got a very special view, you could say. He’s really striving for stuff that hasn’t really been done or shown, he’s never settled for being the same as everyone else. He’s always trying to find new spots, build new spots, find new ideas. For me it’s been fantastic, getting out, shooting stuff and skating, building and creating as friends and as partners for all these years. Creating these photos from the ground up, building a spot or putting something in your car to transport to an existing spot to tweak it and make it your own…

Moulding the city to fit what you need as a skateboarder. And like you said before, if you live in Northern Europe it’s probably not going to be as easy as just walking out your door and skating something amazing without putting in a lot of work first. As someone who has shot all over but whose work is indelibly associated with Malmö, what is it about the city that inspires you? 

I don’t know… I’m not shooting a lot of photos these days to be honest. Photography for me was this whole being a part of something, doing stuff together with my friends, and it’s not the same anymore. We’re not at Savanna Side building together, filming or shooting photos, and I miss those things. I’m super proud of what we’ve created and the projects that have come out of this, it’s different now though. It’s on another level, working with the city closely as opposed to organising a BBQ at the DIY. Malmö is great and what has been created is fantastic, though what worries me a little bit these days is that people have been spoiled, the new generation has it all. But there is a really young crew here building their own DIY spot, Kusatracks DIY, which is super rad. Some are the kids of the older skaters and they’ve done some super rad stuff. So it does exist but the scene here is quite broad, I would say, so I don’t really know what’s going on everywhere.

I like it when skate photographers are so connected visually to a city. You don’t see it too much these days but combos like Tobin Yelland and San Francisco, or Mike O’Meally and Sydney. Who influenced you with regards to how they shot their hometown spaces?

I like that parallel, I’ve never thought about that. I was completely in love with San Francisco because of Tobin Yelland and Gabe Morford, they shot the people that I was interested in and they’re really who got me into photography. I wanted to shoot what they shot, basically. When you think about San Francisco and skating you think about those two guys, what they’ve shot and the impact they’ve had. They really created a vibe that put the city on the map. I’ve never thought that my photos could do that, but I guess you’re right. It’s hard, I mean I don’t cover everything. What I do is quite niche and the group I shot with were a big chunk of the Malmö scene back in the day, but it wasn’t everyone. There are more stories to be told in Malmö. 

It’s fun to look back through my photos and see the changes in the city. Now I might not be super active, I’m not the one at the newest spots shooting the photos – I don’t even have a photo from Love Park yet, for example – but, looking back, I can see one of my first photos is taken in the old shipyard area where ten years later we built Stapelbäddsparken. It’s pretty rad going through your photos and seeing the differences in architecture that reflect these changes.

You’ve worked with Phil before, during the making of Format Perspective. How did the process differ between the two projects?

Quite a lot. I wasn’t supposed to be doing a film at all. Phil had an idea, he wanted to make a pilot to pitch this idea I had about doing a series on skate photographers. Since I’d already been in one I didn’t want to be in another one, but I agreed to be in the pilot. He pitched it to a few different skate brands and other brands involved in the scene but had trouble getting anyone to commit because of budget, no one had money. He had worked with Fuji before and there was a lot of footage in this pilot of me with Fuji cameras, so he pitched it to them and they really liked it as it was then. So it was supposed to be a little 4 or 5 minute clip, a kind of Fuji commercial. He had almost finished, he just lacked some stuff so he was talking to Pontus to get some archive stuff. As soon as we opened up the archive stuff there was so much good footage, and the idea just turned around. We had so much stuff and Phil tried to use as much as possible. Suddenly this 5 minute thing was 15 minutes, then it was 30 minutes, and he and Pontus agreed on making it something proper. Pontus went in on supporting the project and gave Phil full access to the archive. Then it changed and became something I wanted to be a lot more involved with – we had a story to tell, about the development of the Malmö skate scene, which is great. I’m very stoked that this can be told in the film.

You’ve been shooting photos for magazines for years, witnessing the transition from analogue to digital film change the ease in which skate photography could be picked up. Then later, the transition from print to digital media finished off a lot of the larger magazines and caused a proliferation of smaller free mags to follow. Where do you find your place in this changing media landscape?

I mean for me, I wasn’t really working for anyone. I’ve never been a working photographer, I’ve always done it on the side and contributed to different magazines. My focus has always been to be a part of and be involved with the scene here in Malmö, documenting what’s going on here. When Pontus started Polar that became a natural continuation and, since I had Polar to focus on, there was always a destination for everything we did. We went on trips, gathered the photos, got them published in different magazines; for me it was just ongoing until I started to drop off. I was going on a lot of trips and, when I stopped doing that, I wasn’t out on the streets of Malmö here that much, it would just be when people visited with the Polar crew. All the original crew started to have families, all that kind of thing. But it’s been a long journey to here, I think it was 1998 when I first had photos published in the Swedish skateboard mag. Since then I’ve been through a lot of the magazines… then they disappeared. It’s fun, I kind of miss it. Me and a friend used to run an online magazine, Defect, when internet magazines were quite new. It was the only magazine in Sweden for quite a while.

It has similarities to DIY spots in a way, doesn’t it? Putting these elements together, figuring out what works and what doesn’t, and feeling like you’re adding to things.

Yeah, you’re helping to build the scene, you’re making connections, you’re a big part of the skate scene and it feels great.

As someone long involved with Bryggeriet, when you are asked about skate photography what’s the first piece of advice that you give them?

Obviously, you have to really like skating. Looking at myself, skating came first and all my interest in photography came from skateboard magazines, looking at certain photos that had something which really interested me, like Tobin Yelland for example, or Spike Jonze and all his photos of the Blind team. Shooting photos was just part of skating for me, it was a way of documenting what we were doing but it wasn’t a ‘thing’. It was more like how it was with filming then; “Okay, we have a camera in our crew and we’ll pass it around, now it’s your turn to film me.” Someone needed to make the film of course, but the actual filming was something everyone did, and it was the same with the photography in the beginning. When I go back through my old negatives there are a lot of photos of me that my friends have taken, and so on. So my advice would be… I don’t know if you can really translate that into advice. You just have to like it.

Are there any other subjects you enjoy shooting outside of skateboarding, and if so do these feed into how you approach skate photography in any way?

Well I was never really interested in photography for the photography part, I was just interested in making these skate photos. It never felt like I was a photographer, it just felt like it was my role in this group of people, how I was taking part and being a part of this skate scene. It wasn’t until later I became interested in photography, from following someone like Tobin through to Larry Clark or other documentary type photographers. As all photographers say I think, in the beginning I was so focussed on learning the craft that I just wanted to shoot better skate photos so they looked like the photos in the magazines. You get so focussed you just forget about everything else, and that’s how it was for me for many years. I didn’t really document the scene or what we were doing properly, it wasn’t until much later that I started doing that because I had been introduced to different styles of photography through my favourite skate photographers. But, as soon as I get out of this group of people and this feeling that I’m part of something, then my photography dies off and I’m not really shooting anything else. I do love it, I have photography books and I look at photography a lot, but I don’t see myself as a photographer in that sense. It’s only really when I’m on a trip or building a spot or hanging out on a mission with a group of friends. If I’m not in this environment then I kind of forget about my camera. It’s a social thing, it’s my way of being a part of something and my contribution.