At the US Open in March, the two hatched the idea to make an art show out of their books. In May, they spoke to a friend, Jason Rob-inson, at LeZot Camera Shop at home in Burlington, VT. He had an empty 1,500-square-foot room and a large-format printer. They built a miniature model of the room and got to work. “Zach and I sat in my liv-ing room for days with these little printouts and just kept moving them around until we were satisfied with how we wanted the gallery to look and then [designer] Andrew [Lakata] put it all together,” Blotto says. Robinson donated three days of his time to printing and hanging the show, and in November, they plastered the space from floor to ceil-ing to create what Blotto calls “total immersion.” Families and friends came through and partied until midnight. “Peo-ple’s reactions were priceless,” Blotto says. “They started saying, ‘Man, I should put down my phone a little more often and just doodle.’” It was a night that drew the pair back to a season spent collaborat-ing with friends on something beyond the digital realm. “There are a lot of snowboarders who carry books around and doodle and build their own scrapbooks; we’re not the only ones doing it,” Zach says. “Even guides are drawing peaks in their notebooks—more people are doing it than you think.” “The camaraderie that you build together with everyone pitching in on a book is pretty dang cool,” Blotto adds. “I’m very happy that I have possession of this book that has so many individuals’ contribu-tions in it.” While the two have discussed further shows, they don’t have any concrete plans to put together another exhibit. They have, however, already started scrapbooks for a new season—they went to Japan to-gether last fall and brought fresh books along to start anew. “To have something tangible to hold that you made with your friends has such lasting value in your life,” Zach says. “It’s so nice to sit around and rip pages out—everyone’s working on something, playing music, hanging out. The process is the point.” 050 THE SNOWBOARDER’S JOURNAL
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