Who Was Barney

He surfed in a Spider-Man wetsuit.

That was Shawn "Barney" Barron. Santa Cruz.

He died on Cinco de Mayo, 2015. He was 44. Santa Cruz paddled out for him.

HE SURFED

Shawn Barney Barron riding a large wave. Photo by Frank Quirarte.
Photo: Frank Quirarte

Surfer magazine cover, September 1989.

First aerials contest ever held in Santa Cruz, he won it at eighteen.

Mavericks, with the Westside crew.

Hotline sponsored him for twelve years.

A turn at Steamer Lane, Santa Cruz, holding a tennis racket.
Steamer Lane. Photo: Santa Cruz Waves

The Spider-Man suit was not the only one. There was an Aquaman. There was a stormtrooper.

He could walk anywhere on his hands. Down a staircase. Up one.

Flea was his best friend.

HE PAINTED

Shawn Barney Barron in his shed with an elephant painting and his orange elephant surfboard.

He painted constantly. Oil, mostly.

He painted his own boards.

Star patterns. The moon. Aliens. Superheroes in space suits. Dots and circles. The ocean. Animals. Nudes.

The UFOs came from their father, who used to take him to obscure science fiction films in Berkeley. Amelia's words: "Shawn ate it up."

About his art teacher, Katie Harper, he said she really taught him how to see.

He called it Barney Art. His motto for it was "anyone can do it!"

From a 2011 interview: "Everybody can be an artist. A lot of time people get frustrated because they try to be as realistic as possible. But you don't have to be realistic. That's what I love about it."

THINGS THAT EXIST

A board with 9BARN hand-lettered across the bottom of it. Willz from Ribsy's Nickel painted it about twenty years before there was a company, and signed it. We still have the board.

A robot he built out of his own surf trophies. He made a film about it.

A bench on West Cliff.

Cinco de Barney, at Steamer Lane, every year in early May. Flea hosts it.

January 2017, R. Blitzer Gallery on the Westside, his paintings on the walls.

Nobody asked for any of it.

WHAT 9BARN IS

His paintings, on real things. Prints made from the original canvases. Shirts, hats and decks carrying his art.

We hold the work. We're putting out what he made.