White Lung is a Vancouver punk band formed by a bunch of ex-figure skaters. Mish Way sings, Grady MacIntosh plays bass, Anne-Marie...
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Color 10.3 Editor's Letter Buy This Issue Now
music
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Puncturing White Lung
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Tale of the Tape
In 2009, a few friends from local power pop band Thee Makeout Party set up a record store in their sleepy college town of Fullerton,......
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BASED on a true story
Lil B hoists a pair of worn out Vans above his head as enthralled fans scream out, “Thank you Based God!” The music begins to fade......
life
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NEXT / BEST
We were digging around a box of old photos when we came across a lost roll of film circa 2001 that Ryan Smith had shot on one of his......
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TATTERED TEN
Hugo Balek might be from Montreal—it depends who you ask. He’s been described has a mutant (a McGill University experiment gone......
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RED FLAGGED
At 3pm I got a call from Jamie Tancowny saying he was on the bus from L.A. and would be arriving later that evening in Vancouver. He......
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FACES N SPACES
Yanick Nolet is a DIY renaissance man. A pillar of the Montreal skate scene, Nick is a co-founder of Father Skateboards and one of......
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Philadelphia
Philly is like the Wild West—there is a certain amount of lawlessness one feels when walking down the street and seeing a gang of......
film
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Larry Kent
Ten years ago I met Larry Kent and my life was changed forever. I had just graduated from Vancouver Film School’s acting department......
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NORTH
When we decided that this would be our ‘History’ issue, I wanted to be conscious about not getting carried away with all the ‘where......
skate
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Shazam
It’s amazing how Alexis Lacroix manages to do so much and still look like he isn’t even trying. His messed up hair and laidback......
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UNCOVERED
The sheer number of skate photos that are shot each year is almost incalculable. You’d have to be Stephen Hawking or have access......
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Triple Entendre
The Bos brothers are a package deal. Between the three of them (Josh, Jake and Adam) they have all the angles covered. Josh is the......
fashion
art
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Outsider Lines
Gabriel Dubois’ studio and palette exist in the alley, at home, in the backyard and occasionally (as Color found him, scribbling......
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SHOW
Time is a bitch. The funny thing is though, despite how adversarial it may seem, time is on your side; it just needs a little finessing......
Editor's Letter
For the same reason I adore skateboarding, I’ve always loved stories, and when you get to be around my age, you pride yourself on having more than a few of them to share.
10 years ago, right around this time, I felt like I was in the centre of it all… Vancouver was a melting pot for skateboarding, as it still is today, but before Berger, Papa, and DeCenzo there was another class of skateboarders who had transplanted themselves here from all around the country to hone their skills. I was lucky enough to watch them germinate with incredible prowess; each one of them developing their own unique personalities. This wasn’t like what I had learned about skateboard lifestyle through videos and magazines at the time, these people had an art gallery in their skateshop and they were out at shows, living just like me!
I couldn’t quite put my finger on what was unfolding all around me, so I set out on a mission to make a magazine that represented a movement in skateboarding based upon creativity and the great efforts that were being made in and around it. Sounds simple enough, but at the time, this hadn’t been done before. I certainly wasn’t overqualified to make it happen but I was keen to the challenge, so I made sacrifices and managed to navigate my way through it all because, well, sometimes a story just needs to be told.
We consider this issue of Color you hold in your hands The History Issue. Every aspect of its contents has some bigger reason for being there. You will find the untold story of the original North video—a piece of work that defined an entire generation in Canadian skateboarding. For me, North meant a means to the beginning, that skateboarding wasn’t something I had to grow out of, because it was evolving right there with me. Seeing how everyone involved held the highest standard
for quality showed me that we deserved a magazine that followed those same ideals.
In this issue, we spill a few untold stories, from an artist feature with Gabriel Dubois, who was right in the thick of it when I was still trying to break ground, to a hopeful young skater who has appeared over the years in videos we’ve helped make with Jeremy Elkin, but has never been able to get photos into any magazines… until now. We learn about Canada’s first indie filmmaker and tell you what happened when we found Moses Itkonen’s old handmade run-ups in the back of a truck and then put them to today’s test.
Each time I’m able to see such great features like these materialize, I feel an unexplainable sense of achievement, as if we’ve already succeeded in getting some kind of point across or that another chapter in our ongoing story is complete. Although there are some classic images within this issue, everything you’ll find in this magazine has never been published before, and maybe some needed to be seen now, to refresh our memories and to get you psyched.
Digging through boxes containing the last 10 years of Color, it’s been incredibly rewarding to see how we’ve grown and just how much the magazine hasn’t changed at all! It has gotten a hell of a lot better, but still, at its root, it continues to be a direct reflection of the person I’ve come to know as myself. Looking back on 45 issues is literally a time capsule of my own life interests, beginning in 2003. Whether it was something I was able to bring to the table or an artist/musician I was introduced to through the grips of one of the editors, I stand by every damn piece. I won’t say it was all good, but then again, I said it was a reflection of me. And we’re not so different, you and I. —Sandro Grison
COVER ART by Gabriel Dubois
