Pray

For a super secular Jew, Catholic iconography has always felt like a strange sanctuary. What started as a fascination in high school when I visited a church in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico where priests flog themselves on Sundays has turned into a closeted belief in Saint Jude and the Virgin of Guadalupe. Visiting the Cloisters magically removed me from the overwhelming beauty and stress of Spring with everyone blooming. A piece of peace raised above the city full of mystery enabled me to catapult myself back into the melee that is New York.













-Royal
Photos: Amanda Segur

Fifteen Minute Flash

“Everyone Will Be Famous for 15 Minutes” Like every other New York dandy born after 1980, I love Warhol. He allows me to dream big, in fantastic colorama. This exhibition features polaroids of famous faces. Everyone is a celebrity. Viewers also have inflated egos, more talent than “anyone else” and damn it they SHOULD be adored.
-Baruch College/Sidney Mishkin Gallery, till 5/22.



“Mosqueteros” I personally prefer “Dear ol’ Papa Picasso,” for work from the later part of his life. Here we see a gentler, more vulnerable Picasso, but in no way has he lost his flare.
- Gagosian Gallery 21st Street, till 6/6.



“Love Monster” is street art I would hang in my bathroom. I’ve got raunchy taste. Aiko’s work is sexy.
-Joshua Liner Gallery, till 5/16.



“The Birth of Expressionism in Dresden and Berlin” left me in love with German expressionism. I first discovered artists Ernst Kirchner and Erich Heckel as a teen. What raw, free, feeling! What courage! What intuition!
-The Neue Gallery, till 6/29.



"To me his paintings are elements in a larger, continuous conceptual performance piece about being gay in twenty-first-century America.” Says New York Times art critic Holland Cotter of Hernan Bas “Works from the Rubell Family Collection.” His historical contribution to gay history is great, but I love his dynamic images for themselves. I dig the way he takes classical, romantic imagery, dashing it with Goths and references to Oscar Wilde and The Hardy Boys.
-Brooklyn Museum, till 5/24.



Nicolas Darrot’s “Fuzzy Logic,” features a parrot with an electric helmet and a mariachi skeleton on a horse.
-Cueto Project, till 6/20.



-Suhatca Nuriyah Panya

The Party's Crashing Us Now

Whirlwind night! Thanks to everyone who came out and made it amazing! Thanks for interacting with the ads, the brands and each other. I know that we at Pomp had a blast talking to you and putting some faces to the names we've been working with. And to all the new faces, welcome to the fold.

Now as promised here are some party photos...

Pomp Out West: Constellations

-Charlie Koliha

Party Countdown

The drummer from Def Leppard, Rick Allen, lost his arm in a car accident. His first thought coming to was "I'm the drummer from Def Leppard, and I don't have a fucking arm!" Right now we at Pomp know just how he feels, sans missing limb of course.



We've been working hard for the celebration tomorrow so we know it's all going to be worth it. I think ole' Ricky up there would agree.

- Kastoory and Royal

Surreal World

Author Daniel Chacon started off his first Brooklyn appearance at Perch Café in Park Slope, by asking his friend, Amanda, to sing. Daniel hadn’t seen her since 2000 when they met in Cuba. She obliged, singing a few bars of “Amazing Grace.” It was a benediction, a blessing to begin the reading.

Daniel read two stories from his newest book, Unending Rooms. “The Velocity of Mass,” is about an elderly priest that can deliver mass in five minutes flat, a miracle in itself.

He also read “John Boyd’s Story,” which follows the only two “persons of color” at a creative writing program in Oregon. John Boyd, a Native American, writes a story about a Native American man who teaches a white boy what it’s like to grow up on a reservation. After an unforgettably harrowing lesson, (and a fun moment for me, knowing the story and hearing the audience’s collective gasp), the characters in “John Boyd’s Story” respond by asking him, “Why so angry?”

I had met Daniel Chacon two years earlier, at Fresno State University in California. In my senior year as an English major he returned to his alma mater to teach, taking a break from El Paso. His literary heroes are Garcia Lorca and Andres Montoya. Daniel and I were both born and raised in Fresno. When we met, I was wrestling with the idea of moving away for the first time for graduate school to study publishing. At the top of my list was New York City. He encouraged me to pursue what I wanted.

Fast-forward two years: he’s reading from his third book, I’m in Brooklyn to hear it. I told Daniel about my idea to start up a book company publishing multicultural literature. “Let’s do it for real,” he suggested. “Fresno has a wealth of writing talent.” My silent reaction was, “A publishing company? In this economy? Ha!” I realized he has a history of achieving the unlikely. Like the characters he writes about, diverging from cultural norms to believe the magical.



Perch Café has literary readings every Tuesday night. 365 5th Avenue, Brooklyn.

-Sharn Dhah

Ringmaster

The elephant cruelty protesters didn't stop me from bum rushing box seats at Madison Square Garden for the circus. Still, between sips of free Bud from the packed mini fridge, I cringed when I heard whip cracks from the cat cage amplified. Being high above the screaming crowd and safe from clowns was plush, but I sort of missed the sawdust, sweat and scares of sitting under the tightrope walkers, not looking down at them. Still, the big top is magic and luxury always makes me loony. Gorging on five dollar foot long hot dogs made me giddy, then sick. I'm not a kid anymore, but still people shooting out of canons sends shivers. If "there's a sucker born every minute" -P.T. Barnum, count me one.





















-Royal
Photos: Amanda Segur

Pomp Prefers Parties on Boats for Warm Weekends

Play It Passionate

As a nerdy Jewish high school girl in Livingston, New Jersey, I couldn’t get close to the group of guys everyone else found attractive. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to. “It” boys owned the hallways in Varsity jackets and low-slung jeans. I tried hard, but couldn’t see what made them the ones I should want to be with.

When I was a freshman at Tufts University, there was a guy I’ll call Jimmy. 5’9” with thick lips, long lashes, black hair, slight build. He was kind and sometimes funny and socially awkward in an endearing way. A nice acquaintance, nothing more.

Then he picked up a guitar.

When Jimmy played gigs at the campus center, singing his own songs or covering “Sunday Bloody Sunday,” he sounded romantic and full of promise. He became someone interesting. His allure was not the result of my strong Captain n Coke or sleep deprivation from the Philip Roth midterm essays I’d been writing until 3 a.m. He was hot because music was his passion. Eyes closed, houselights dimmed, he spilled his soul. He sang with conviction. Jimmy now works in finance.

I was certain at a young age my passion was to play with language. Post college, I’m trying to discover how to make my passion a profession.

I’m afraid if I follow my dreams, I’ll ruin them. I worry by trying to make writing functional, not fun, I’ll end up forgetting what I loved.

I need to get my voice out there somehow. I cannot imagine doing anything else, but I need to make a living. Hope is fading as I hear over and over that now isn’t a good time. NOW is the only time I have. While I try to forget fear, I wait for someone to realize I’m not fucking around.

=Carly Okyle

Art Walk

There is an explosion of arts and culture all over Brooklyn, and not just off the L train with the usual posers. The Atlantic Avenue neighborhood is oozing with cultural goodness, as well as a crazy juxtaposition of neighborhoods. Park Slope, Boerum Hill and downtown Brooklyn all face-off!

I’ve learned so much about the hood, over the past few months I've been co-producing. Atlantic Avenue ArtWalk is in it's sixth year, as a weekend long self-guided walking tour of local galleries. Held by non-profit AALDC(Atlantic Avenue Local Development Corporation). So you're a Brooklynite but don't have a gallery and don't live close to Atlantic Avenue? Who cares! They find a space to host your work. Pair ups with chill restaurants more than willing to share wall space, or vacant storefronts morph into showcases.



To register online click here

-Corinne Kassor

Double Agents

On Friday, I met Suhatcha and Royal at KGB bar to hear Kate Walter read. “Tourguide to The Real New York” chronicled her niece’s visit from out of town, inevitably placing Walter in the role of tour guide to her own lifestyle. I dug Walter’s brusque honesty and bare bones storytelling style.



After the reading, we subway-ed to Brooklyn for Media Lounge, a digital arts festival at Grace Exhibition Space. Rob Bowman of BK Salsa performed with his band, The Blue and Red. They'll be partying with us and Posterboy plus DTs(?) at our 3rd Ward event.



I didn’t notice guests wearing 3-D glasses or the free wine, way too captivated by sheets hanging from light fixtures like electric jellyfish. These created make-out rooms in the middle of the floor, where you could escape the crowd to feel up a friend, gossip or smoke a bowl (not that I participated in any of those offenses, officer).



Media Lounge is essentially a party. The creators of the space are “whole heartedly dedicated to the open source aesthetic,” which sounds pretty good, though if you asked me to define, “open source aesthetic,” I would go hide inside those sheets. Their next goal, “striving to create a space where everything from the ideas to the drinks are free,” No objections, whatsoever.



-Hannah Miet

You're invited!

I know we've been vaguely hinting at some mysterious party we'll be having soon. What with talk of giftbags, djs and all things dance-y and springtime-y. We're finally ready to unveil the plans to you dear readers, you are our world.

So you may have heard of Poster Boy, we have too. We have an interview with him in the upcoming issue (due out in May!) and we wanted to collaborate on some sort of event. We came up with Brooklynnovation, and here is his take on what he wants the event to be: "This is not a show of [my] work. This is an opportunity to create [my] work yourself. This is for people who wouldn't normally partake in vandalism. The materials will be provided by [me]. Hopefully this encourages people to rethink advertising and their environment"


Pomp & Circumstance Party Invite from pomp and circumstance on Vimeo.

Shot by: Fury Young
Assisted by: Ayberk
Edited by: Dylan Thuras
Graphics by: Michelle Enemark
Actor: Royal Young
Concept : Stephen Bruckert
Producer: Kastoory Kazi
Music by: Peaches (New album out May 4th! We can't afford permission sorry!)

Be thurr or be squrr.

-The Editors

Bring It Back!

In seventh grade at my Chelsea middle school across from a gay bar called Rawhide, my Puerto Rican friend with a mushroom cut proclaimed his lunch time pizza was "Butta."

Urban Dictionaryhas a few definitions. In the Lower East Side of the mid '90s, it mostly meant:

"having a particularly illmatic quality; sweet; nice
'If lookin' good is like being on time, man, THAT girl is fifteen minutes early.'
'Yeah, she's butter.'"

This is also butter.



If brought back I propose we pronounce it "Butta" with a slight 'D' sound on the T's.

Should we bring it back?

-Royal

Pomp Videos: The Importance of Being Earnest

Whew, interesting day. Lovely weather, bit of snowfall mixed in with the sun and clouds. And then I used the term "j'ing off" in class, in front of my teacher. Neither the time, nor the place.

After class, a fellow student/friend asked me what I thought the next hipster trend would be. I thought about it for all of 2 seconds before answering, earnestness. Earnestness? asked Friend, what do you mean? I tried to explain how I think being earnest is really cool. It shows a sincere pride in what you do, but also that you don't take yourself too seriously. It illustrates a certain attachment to the world, a detachment from apathy. In other words, it's going to be all the rage (kind of like the Pride and Prejudice with ZOMBIES book, so freaking earnest).

My first example, George Michael. No, not the one who was caught j'ing off in the bathroom (ah... right time and place). The one who loves his cousin Maeby, and whose show got canceled but who kept showing up in movie screens as different versions of his television self. Or maybe it's Michael Cera. I can't really tell the difference and I don't want to. He's so earnest! As Friend so passionately said when I brought him up as my example, "I love him for that!"



This song has been on repeat in my head (and iPod, sorry roommates and neighbors) for a couple of weeks now. Then I found this and began watching it over and over.



Another lovely example of the trend is Queen Noor on The Colbert Report .

And finally, a video trailer made by the people at Harper Perennial (incidentally they will also be sponsoring our next Pomp party, read: giftbags!)



I can't help myself, I still love a good Smiths reference.

Any earnest role models that you have?

-Kastoory

Scandal Sheet: Menacing Matrons

Growing up working-class Russian-Jewish (I am half and half) in Northeast Philadelphia, as a child and teen I was always nearby violence. I learned to walk with keys in my knuckles, surviving a mugging. Considering my experimenting with boys, drugs and styles in the mid ‘90s: hippie/skater/punk/raver, I was lucky.

After living in Japan I was through with the thrill of the hood. I spent one summer in West Philly and was not enchanted with the grittiness or the harassment. I did not grow up rich or suburban and had no exoticism attached to the ghetto.

When by luck and chance my good friend’s extremely affordable room in Park Slope opened up at the exact time I needed to begin the Teaching Fellowship, I took it.

I was in love with the Slope! There were trees on the block, the park nearby to jog in and the co-op. I loved the multi-cultural feel. A global dater, I could stroll with partners without shame!

Friends of friends delight in indulging in poverty chic by slumming in Bushwick, dodging mom and dad’s trust fund payments.

I delighted in walking with my shoulders relaxed, a yoga bag not being stared at and no “Damn, girl! I wish I was your bicycle.” or other variations. Then, a Park Slope mom glared at me, “Why don’t you move to Williamsburg?” She hissed.

For a town of liberals, (yes it’s a fucking town not a neighborhood), I noticed we were never invited to fancy brownstone block film crew set parties. We were the only house renting on the block. The family on our first floor gave us resentful looks for coming home late, smoking cigarettes or-god forbid being single and childless.

I changed jobs and got a hand-me-down car. I parked one Sunday evening on my block, and let the car go for a few days, preferring to walk. When I came back there were two notes:
1) “The street could not be cleaned because of you.”
2) “Lousy parking job by the way.”
I went to move my vehicle when I realized the psycho had SLASHED MY TIRES.

I called the police who filed a criminal mischief report and said they’d be back, never to return. I’ve taken to shouting things on the street like “Share the sidewalk, road, space, co-op!” and a whole lot of “Can Isabelle stamp her own receipt?” My bougie dream drowned by menacing matrons.



-A. Pinsker

Bring It Back!

I saw "Sike" scratched into a subway window Sunday and remembered in the '90s, when my third grade friends were just joking they'd scream "Sike!" Guessing it somehow comes from psych as in to psych someone out. Urban Dictionary says:

Misspelling of slang term "psych", which is short for "psyched out". It can be used at the end of a statement intended to psychologically cause its recipient to be taken off guard or aback, hence allowing for a competitive advantage by the person using the statement. It is intended to be used, & then its success is to be pointed out publicly, as further source of creating an embarrassing competitive edge.

Hey Joey, your sister let me see her naked last night. Sike!

Should we bring it back?

-Royal

Pomp Poetry: Wishful Weekends

Lately, my weekdays have been nauseous with deadlines, applications, schoolwork and other measures to ensure I’m not homeless come June.

As a break from my overcaffeinated workweek, I switched to liquor for the weekend.
On Friday, Whiskey, Diet Coke and I had a glorious reunion. It was at a party downtown with chandeliers and Courvoisier, two c-words that enter my vocabulary with much less frequency than “Colt 45” or “Cunt Circus.”

The night ended with intense PDA in the Union Square station, followed by falling asleep without sheets on my bed.
On Saturday, I woke up at 4 p.m. with a headache, wrote a Political Science paper and ate an Ess-a-Bagel. Then I got on the L to Bushwick, to meet Royal at Café Orwell for the Crowd reading series.

I’m a poet who typically hates poetry readings. But I like wine, and Crowd has a lot of it. This time around, they also had a bottle of Tequila and a poet with a cool name: Macgregor Card. He also edits The Germ.


I could attribute my fondness for Card’s poetry to his stage presence, his spasmodic delivery (does he not know all poets are required to speak in pretentious monotones?), the liquor in my system, or the fact that he’s from Brooklyn. But his poems were also the most idiosyncratic and fun (consequently, the only ones I remember).
He’s one of those poets you can enjoy line-by-line or stanza-by-stanza. “Spasmodic Tragedy” had a lot of short ones, like:
“It doesn’t take a jerk
to lose count in the dark
to jerk off all the lights
everywhere I shiver”

and

“I came to you
in hope that lights need
screwing down a hall
beauty of a ladder on all fours
everywhere at once”

Another Card poem I enjoyed was called…”Poem”:

I crow the verdant lake surf, crow
Can’t deseltzer lake of tourists into reed regatas
Out-disturb supposed gull, ex-garralous tit
Can’t resolve to cleat the former wild familiar neck
A call for drastic woolly cadillac to ease
A load of cans into estate-pie, hurry
Beach the silver and stunt-silver
Be like painter, nature’s own subultimate decider
Hang it on the beach, an actual sober beach
Where is she at, auratic solemnpuss my love
As all best cameos enfronded
Far from single hitch of my decelerrating tug
The surf I crow, self-prickery’s rushed sum
Of reasonable tics, stroke, stroke, stroke
And crow, stroke and actually crow
Like tourist through like travelled recitation, crow

On Sunday, I needed a sober beach. I drank a lot of water and wrote internship cover letters. I met Daniel at work and we ate French food. I prayed that the weekend could be just a weekend longer.

I woke up in Brooklyn to a Mazzy Star ringtone, reluctantly ready for another Monday.

-Hannah Miet

Joke's On Me

It's April Fool's and my cat died. I woke up this morning and watched him dying on the kitchen floor, his fat black body stretched out, mouth open. I was afraid everyone would think I was joking, but they didn't. I guess it was my eyes, they go from gray to clear when I've been crying. I admit I did, briefly, in the bathroom of the preschool where I work, after watching three year-old kids racing at recess. I remember in first grade my teacher read us a short April Fool's chapter of Sideways Stories from Wayside School at storytime. It was only a page long and the whole class begged for another more substantial Louis Sachar fix. She promised us one, licked a finger, turned a page and then smiled "April Fool's!" she shouted. That's how I feel right now. Like a disappointed first grader, not sure what has been taken from me or why. I never understood cruelly twisting someone's expectations, though through elementary school I continued the vicious cycle, generally convincing a friend one of my parents was dead. Now, the loss is real and I'm still stupidly thinking: I wish the cat had told me. Under the scalding spray of my morning shower I half expected to open the bathroom door to him purring over his Meow Mix, a higher power's cruel idea of what this day should be.

-Royal