Travis Rice Level: next
T-Rice has soared into the limelight, thanks to a string of gravity-defying films. But while his latest hi-def hit is still blowing minds across the globe, snowboarding’s most innovative star is already looking skyward for his next big thing.
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On a prematurely chilly, wet September night, The Art of Flight (TAOF) premiered to a sold-out crowd in New York City. Travis Rice pulled up to the red carpet by way of a Rolls Royce, Owen Wilson partied, Justin Timberlake tweeted, and suddenly there was much talk about snowboarding – well, big-mountain riding, to be precise. Overnight, Rice – a two-time X-Games gold winner and Jackson Hole-based online art gallery owner – was catapulted to celebrity status. Why? Because through the aforementioned Brain Farm movie, Rice and his handpicked crew of contest killers, Olympic champs and big-mountain riders helped shake audiences from their X-Games fixation, and took them flying, spinning and bouncing down near-vertical peaks as far into the backcountry as their freaked-out pilot would agree to fly.
Less than a week later, and a packed-out crowd is buzzing around Whistler’s Conference Center. World-tour posters adorn the walls, and Rice skirts through the masses over to Asymbol’s on-the-road gallery space, which he shares with surreal pop artist Mike Parillo, who also happens to design his Lib Tech board graphics. A line-up of blown-up images from four photographers – Scott Serfas, Cole Barash, Danny Zapalac and Oli Gagnon – provide a behind-the-lens glance into the past two years of their sideways-moving lifestyle, and I find myself flipping through one of the coffee-table photo-books that accompany the film, wondering out loud what Rice’s deal is with this two-dimensional world.
“I’m trying to preserve a little bit of the cultural heritage of snowboarding – the art behind it – because it goes hand in hand with its creative spirit,” he says, looking rather Western-esque in a string tie. “I just felt there was a real missing link between the creators and the appreciators. And I figured I had a lot to offer, being a fan myself, as far as organisation and helping people market their work.”
Rice’s girlfriend, Evan Mack, leans over, adding: “Travis sees the world through an artist’s mind, and it shows in his snowboarding. It’s like in TAOF when Nicolas Müller says, ‘Snowboarding is more than just a sport. You pick your own line; it’s your soul that does that.’ I think that Travis has a childlike way of viewing the world. He’s always liked discovery – exploring how you can see things new. Kind of like wiping the slate of his mind clean and being present.”
Despite being at the epicentre of the posters, book, gallery, and films, Rice takes a modest approach. He insists that it’s all been a collective effort, giving credit to all the riders who were there, shoulder-to-shoulder, through all the shots. But that’s not to say he’s not feeling the spotlight’s heat.
“I was always kind of pumped on the notion that snowboarding was kind of niche. Unless there is that die-hard, snowboard-mag-reading kid that religiously watches the videos, you don't get hit up in the streets,” says Rice as he offers to buy me a drink, while taking time to exchange words with each autograph-seeking fan. “With this film, it’s gone to the next level; I can’t hang out in the lobby of one of our normal film premieres.”
Beyond the hubbub, however, Rice points to the positive fallout of fame. He insists that if people become more aware of big-mountain riding through TAOF - if it leads to more support from companies, more projects, more employment, more kids heading out into the backcountry - then he is winning. “Go outside, get off the computer, put down the video game, and go experience a bit of this world in three dimensions,” he adds, “because it makes every one that immerses themselves in nature happy. The more happier people there are, the better we all are.”
The cast is soon called on stage. Rice bounces up. Winter junkies cheer like they’re getting fresh tracks. Lights fade to black and, suddenly, one can almost feel the chopper blades turning, as if you’re standing on the plateau of a powder-coated cornice, ready to straight-line down a narrow chute.
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Travis Rice (text) by Natalie Langmann is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
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