Douglas Miles developed and founded Apache Skateboards in 2002, one of the earlier skateboard companies to blend fine art, pop culture, and sport by bringing the reservation community together through these avenues. Miles’ latest photographic series, Res Skate Demo, speaks on lineage and legacy within this community whose roots are deeply embedded across the Americas.

Since its original inception, the Apache Skateboard program has expanded to include the arts, education, political awareness and empowerment by connecting mainstream skateboard culture with contemporary Native life. Many of the skateboard designs depict Apache warriors and the youth of the San Carlos Apache reservation on skateboard decks. In June 2024, Zumiez, the specialty retailer of action sports related apparel, footwear, equipment and accessories began carrying Apache Skateboards products in select stores across the country.

My photography blends raw and present elements from our past to point out the hardships and the joy of being Native all at once, now. The terror, triumph, turmoil and beauty of what we’ve seen, endured and overcome is what these photos are about now. We don’t distance ourselves from the past because it’s what made us who we are today and we always want to live up to the greatness of those that have come before us. – Douglas Miles

By appropriating online early images of Apache Native Americans and juxtaposing them with his own contemporary photographs of his community with his street mural graphics, Douglas brings us from the past to the present day in a two dimensional image but creating a three dimensional reality. The contrast of his sharp contemporary imagery made with his hand-held smart phone, alongside often pixelated images found online of early Native American portraits, the viewer is transported through time both viscerally and literally.