Wednesday, December 21, 2016

Winter Solstice

Years ago, the morning of the Winter Solstice would bring a strange parade of clowns moving through the East Village. It happened every year. And yet it seems, looking back, like a hallucination. Did it really happen?






In this colorful and strange parade from the 1990s, a blue-haired queen rides a white horse pushed by clowns. One clown bangs a drum.





Bringing up the rear, another pair of clowns pushes a rolling rack of white gowns. They seem to have angel wings.

Who were these people? What was this all about? And why did it end?

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4 comments:

  1. ScoutDecember 21, 2016 at 9:57 AM

    True - sadly, this city is no longer a welcoming place for true bohemians. Unless they have a trust fund (and then they aren't really bohemian, are they?).

    ReplyDelete
  2. Andrew PorterDecember 21, 2016 at 10:59 AM

    Alas, I can't answer your question. Perhaps the times changed, the artistic people who used to do this got older, moved away, were gentrified out of the area.

    I recently asked a whole bunch of locals and newspapers why and when the Brooklyn Heights Promenade Art and Craft fair, held twice a year in the 70s and, I think, into the 90s ended. No one had an answer.

    ReplyDelete
  3. JamesDecember 21, 2016 at 12:11 PM

    I remember the Bang on a Can festival when it was in an old barn of a place in Alphabet City. It is now featured in major halls, like any other not-for-profit organization. Things just grow up, sadly but sometimes necessarily.

    ReplyDelete
  4. The End of HistoryDecember 30, 2016 at 10:49 PM

    This was just another glitch in the Matrix.

    ReplyDelete

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