Ithaka (artist)

Ithaka Darin Pappas (born July 8, 1966), known professionally as Ithaka, is an American-born multidisciplinary artist of Greek ancestry who creates using music, writing, sculpture and photography (both as separate entities or using them in combination with each other). He has authored a collection of poems and short stories, entitled Ravenshark Chronicles published in international magazines and periodicals, which have sometimes been the basis for his travel-oriented lyrical content. In 2025, Expresso newspaper stated that Ithaka's lyrics Forget the past, go outside, have a blast are words that, at one point in the 90s, had as much impact around the world as Timothy Leary's famous expression: Turn on, tune in, drop out. In a 2005 article for the magazine Waves, journalist Ricardo Macario described Ithaka as "The Miscellaneous Man". In a 2008 review of Ithaka's sixth album Saltwater Nomad, the online surf-culture platform Surfline stated that "the artist effortlessly traverses at ease between all of his choses mediums of expression [music, sculpture, writing and photography]", and that "his life's journey is a soulful balancing act somewhere between the worlds of euphoric creation and aquatic diversion."