CANNON’S Compass
Nick Cannon’s life has been far from ordinary. Long before he was an internationally known entertainer, Cannon was just a kid growing up with his grandparents who was obsessed with music. Cannon wanted to pay homage to his incredible journey with a tattoo mapping out his past, present and future. Tattoo artists Maria Garza (@brightbones) and Sherri Austria-Portela (@sherriaustria) spent two days tattooing Cannon’s chest and neck here at Inked NYC, giving the entertainer a piece that spans many chapters. Afterwards, we sat down with Cannon to give him the opportunity to share his story, in his own words.
I grew up in southeast San Diego. I have “South East’’ tattooed on my forearm, which is where I was born. I was a kid, in government housing, really just trying to stay out of trouble. My parents were teenagers when they had me, so it was a little unorthodox situation. My father went away to be a minister. He actually left California so he would get out of trouble because he grew up a troubled youth. He just had a baby and he’s like, “I gotta get out of here.” So he went to college in North Carolina. My mom went to nursing school and it was really difficult trying to take care of me. My father’s mother stepped in as well and that trifecta of all of them was my upbringing.
My parents were teenagers, so we kind of grew up together. They were trying to get their lives right while blazing a path for me.
[There] was always youthful exuberance around because everybody was young. I remember when my grandmother was my age right now, that’s weird [laughs]. It was really just a loving environment. Obviously, there wasn’t an abundance of
