![eazy e skateboard eazy e skateboard](https://www.dhresource.com/0x0/f2/albu/g6/M00/57/47/rBVaSFvFloCAXE3JAAB2cQO42Wk212.jpg)
It was a shock to me, and he'd obviously spent some time on a skateboard because he knew what he was doing. I'd already been working with this crew for probably almost two years and I'd never even heard the word skate board came out of anybody's mouth, or surfing, or anything like that. Eazy grabbed some kid's skateboard and took off.
![eazy e skateboard eazy e skateboard](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/CczmhJD1l54/maxresdefault.jpg)
After the Kris Kross bailed we all walked down to the skate area down there on the beach at Venice. Fab 5 Freddy did the interview, an old-school artist and hip-hopper from New York. Kris Kross came down and we all met in Venice. This particular day was a shoot for MTV and they were doing a little culture clash unite between this pop group Kris Kross and N.W.A. probably more than any other photographer. I was their main freelance photographer during this period and I had photographed N.W.A. Ithaka: At the time I was working for Priority Records. GA: Tell us about the cover photo and how you got to that point with N.W.A? Fascinated by our cover photo of Eazy-E in Venice I grabbed him for the real story and the back story on a few of his other favorite pics.Īll photos courtesy of Ithaka Darin Papas/Tack Artist Group He had shot their album covers, editorial and more. And, it wasn’t until the feature film Straight Out Of Compton landed in theaters that I learned Ithaka had spent two years with N.W.A. Each layer was a wild adventure his life was coated with wonder. I got to know him, and he was an unraveling onion. We later went surfing and I was blown away by his ability in the surf. He snapped a few pics while we were hanging out. When I first met Ithaka six years back, he came over to my pad with a little point and shoot camera. He's that guy that you want to hate on but you just can't. That friend who hears a tune once and can play it on any instrument and he also happens to tell the best stories all-the-while completely nonchalant about the said above. The guy who picks up sports quicker than anyone. This brotherly bond led to (for-better-or-for-worse) the commercial cross pollination of the skate and rap worlds, absorbing them both into collective 'street culture'.We all have a friend like Ithaka Papas he’s the one everyone's jealous of. From then on, these two international counter-culture tribes began to view each other with less suspicion and slowly began merge, becoming nearly inseparable by the early 2000s. And on the other hand, rebellious skateboarders with their roots firmly embedded in the punk rock movement began to see similarities between their own urban plights and those depicted in the lyrics of many rap songs. Eazy E, being a major hip hop celebrity with street credibility, publicly endorsing skateboarding seem to green-light (almost instantaneously) for rappers and rap fans everywhere to either start skating, admit that they already did skate, or at the very least accept skateboarding fraternally. It was considered a pivotal moment in both communities. The original photographs from that day first ran in Thrasher Magazine (1989), the most globally recognized skateboarding publication in history. Before this time, skateboarding and hip hop were not often associated amicably in the media and even perceived as being openly hostile toward one another.
![eazy e skateboard eazy e skateboard](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/613rk3AaK2S._AC_SL1500_.jpg)
In this short subject non-dialogue documentary, photographer Ithaka Darin Pappas reexamines the historic photo session he conducted on February 24th 1989 between NWA member, rapper Eazy E (1964-1995), and a a hardcore crew of Venice skateboard locals.