The fact that the park is built for skating with perfect conditions
While I get what you're getting at here I think that this line of thinking needs to stop being the go-to phrase or idea when this (very thought provoking question) comes up.
1. I don't know about you guys, but the
ONLY time any given skatepark I've enjoyed skating over the years could be considered to have "perfect conditions" is when the park is fucking empty;
No unaware kids skating into your line causing you to jump off wildly, no skatepark parents ferrying their foetus around on a tricycle, no scooter kids "landing" tricks infront of you with one foot landing before they do.
Yes, the obstacles themselves are designed to be skated but the conditions in skateparks are, the majority of the time, far from perfect. The few challenging sort of people I mentioned above are just as off putting- and I would argue are often more-so- as run of the mudd pedestrians you encounter and navigate while skating a street spot.
Not to mention that I can honestly say I've skated street spots that have better ground , less off putting cracks and are
far less hazardous etc etc than areas purportedly designed for skating.
Apart from one particular local council park, I have to brush broken glass and shit away from skate spots more often than I have to a skateparks too.
2. The idea of a kickflip nosegrind being less legitimate/authentic or whatever because, as you say , it's being done in a park that "is built for skating with perfect conditions" is a purely philosophical arguement. I've already shown that the idea of perfect conditions is false, so I'm now focusing on the fact that it's the intent behind the obstacles manufacture that apparantley detracts from it.
Part of skatings appeal, the beauty of it, certainly comes from the idea that street skating is interpreting and using the world and it's architecture in a way that non-skaters don't. But that is only if you approach skateboarding philosophically and with a degree of pretense
As far as the obstacles themselves are concerned, I can somewhat concede that a trick performed on an obstacle not explicitly built for skating has a more
pure skateboarding sense to it, but only because I have slightly romanticised notion of how poetic and expressive skating actually is at times. While I understand this notion of skateboarding being poetry in motion, I don't mean that every 5050 on a ledge or kickflip over a bench is poetic.
I do however think it's incredibly reductive to think that real expression of someone truly enjoying Skateboarding and doing something impressive can't be witnessed in a skatepark.
So, the intent behind the obstacle and its birth:
If something is built with the idea of skateboarding being performed
on, in or over it and I skate it in a way not intended by its designer, is that somehow more legitimate a use of the obstacle than a standard trick?
For example:
The Zero kid does a
fs bluntslide to fakie on a skatepark handrail- a manevour that involves someone using the obstacle in a way the original designer had in mind.
Wee Billy Highwaters then
ollies onto a rock position at the top point of the rail before getting his back truck also on the rail, 5050s down it and yanks out.
Is that second shalom somehow more real because the designer of the park probably didn't have that use of the rail in mind when designing it?
3. A current or ex skateboarder, BMXer or roller blader (if they haven't all died from old age) is an architect. Or a surveyor. Or a land use and social development specialist. Their next project has them working on and having a degree of input and influence over the design of a public plaza. The plaza as a result has more skate friendly architecture. Is all skateboarding performed in that plaza or on its obstacles lesser because someone had Skateboarding in mind during its creation?
I don't fucking know the answers. Also I gnarred OP because it's a great question and the two scenarios you gave were very real.