Some collaborations are two logos on a hoodie. This isn't one of those.
We're announcing a collaboration with Dean "Blotto" Gray, a photographer and artist whose work has shaped how a generation of people see snowboarding.
Who Is Dean Blotto Gray
Most people in this world just say Blotto. The nickname has become inseparable from the life he's built around a union of connection and creativity.
Raised in the Southwest and propelled around the globe by the stories he both lives and tells, Blotto has spent decades building a body of work that refuses to sit in one lane.
He's a photographer, artist, author, and public speaker. His work takes many forms: photographs, scrapbooks, abstract painting, immersive collaged environments, travel books, photo shows, and product and art collaborations.
The formats change constantly. The subject doesn't.
He Actually Photographs
Here's the thing that makes Blotto's work different from most action sports photography. He isn't really photographing snowboarding.
The content consistently focuses on the stuff of memories, exceptionally sensory moments in real human life. Many of his subjects involve skateboards, snowboards, and other vehicles for interacting with our surroundings, but always people, the natural world, or both.
That's a meaningful distinction. A trick photo captures a maneuver. Blotto's photos capture what it felt like to be there. The cold, the light, the person, the moment right before or right after the thing everyone else was pointing a camera at.
That's why his work holds up decades later while most action photography looks dated in five years.
The Client List Speaks for Itself
Blotto's work spans far beyond snowboarding. His client list includes Burton, Red Bull, Audi, Oakley, Gucci Ghost, Mini Cooper, ESPN, Samsung, Mountain Dew, Nixon, Skullcandy, Absinthe Films, Analog, Anon, Clif Bar, Martin Guitars, Santigold, and the Chill Foundation, among many others.
That range matters. Someone who can shoot for both Absinthe Films and Gucci Ghost isn't a sports photographer who got lucky. He's an artist working across culture.
Why This Collaboration Makes Sense
Donut Shoppe is a gallery as much as it's a shop. We've said from the start that snowboard imagery is art and deserves to be treated that way. Not as marketing collateral, but as work worth hanging on a wall.
Blotto has been making exactly that case with a camera for thirty years.
The collaboration is a natural fit because the underlying belief is the same. The culture is worth documenting properly, and the documentation is itself the art.
What We're Making
Details on the release are coming. What we can say now is that this is a real collaboration. Blotto's work, shaped into product together, not licensed and slapped onto a blank.
Follow @donut_shoppe for the announcement. As always, the run will be limited.
Blotto in the Gallery
Beyond the product release, we'll be showing work at the Donut Shoppe gallery in Truckee. This is the kind of thing the space was built for. Photography that deserves to be seen at scale, in a room, by people who understand what they're looking at.
Details to follow.
Where to Find Him
Blotto's portfolio and studio information are at deanblottogray.com.
Come See the Work
Donut Shoppe is a concept studio, snowboard shop, and gallery in Truckee, CA. We carry 50+ premium snowboard, skate, and streetwear brands alongside our own label and rotating gallery work.
11209 Brockway Rd, Suite C105, Truckee, CA 96161
Never Go Full Snowboarder.
