What I'm up to: Past and Present

DragCycle

As US governments escalate attacks on Queer, Trans and Drag rights, we bring the art of Drag into everyday life, in a celebratory, accessible form on a roving bicycle stage. A team of artists ride the bicycle, with a sound system playing upbeat dance music, a pile of colorful costumes and wigs, a make-up artist, and a photographer.   We offer easy transformations in Drag for passersby on the street to try within our accessible pop-up DragCycle.  Once decked out in their new look, we will invite them to strike a pose for a photo to capture the moment.  

We hope by bringing the Drag art form out into public view, we can work towards “normalizing” it.  We want to engage regular people on the streets, who might have never encountered Queer performance, or tried on clothes outside their assigned genders. We hope that by creating this joyful space of expression, people feel safe to have dialogue with us and push their curiosity to action through this transformational moment.

We dare to imagine a utopia of liberated self-expression, uncontained and overflowing

A.T.P. (Abolish The Police)

We are A.T.P. (Abolish The Police) an anti-fascist disco punk band based in Brooklyn, NY
Guitar and Bass- Phil Andrews
Keyboard- Nehemiah Luckett
Vocals- Monica Hunken
Drums- Eric Dryburgh

We have many songs but only one recorded and out in the world released on Indigenous People's Day. We honor and stand in solidarity with the original stewards of this land. Our first released song, Silent Sam, is dedicated to all those who fight against fascism and work to tear down racist colonizer monuments across the world.
Song mixed and edited by Phil Andrews
Lyrics by Phil Andrews with Monica Hunken
Video filmed by Tewodros Tamirat
with assistance from Charlene Ruscalleda
Video Edited by Monica Hunken
Follow us on Instagram: @ATPtheband

Al Límite Collective

Al Límite, meaning “At the limit” in Spanish, is a treatise of the body’s revolt. We began working together in The Living Theatre, the longest-running experimental theater company in the United States.
We were compelled to create a new collective, brandished in the fires of a global pandemic and the rise of fascism, to imagine and develop systems and relationships with communities across all borders.
In every city we perform, we collaborate with local performers and artists to bring their voices, stories and desires to the forefront and often out in the streets and at sites of injustice. Our ongoing experiment is a practice in communal sharing, a visceral, physical journey that challenges and guides participants in seeking out their own internal transformation by drawing them through a radical collective birth rite. FIND OUT MORE

Funkrust Brass Band

I am lucky to dance, play cymbals and sometimes sing lead vocals through a megaphone with this awesome band! Funkrust Brass Band is a 20-piece post-apocalyptic disco-punk brass band playing all original music with megaphone vocals, heavy tuba bass lines, thundering percussion and searing brass melodies. Their explosive live performances feature full band choreography, signature wasteland/glam uniforms and LED lighting effects. Funkrust.com

The Living Theatre

I was a member of The Living Theatre since 2006.  It is the longest running experimental theater company in the United States.  We  lost our director, co-founder, visionary -Judith Malina, but we carried on forging new work as well as honoring and continuing the traditions of the hundreds of Living members who have come before us.  

 As the world watches the massive deportations and atrocities the US government continues to commit against immigrants, The Living Theatre headed to the frontlines.  We organized a series of workshops and daily performance interventions with locals in Tijuana and San Ysidro, criss crossing the border in the summer heat;  just a taste of what locals experience regularly.  Thanks to our collaborators at Nett Nett and The Front Arte Cultura for hosting us and inviting us into your beautiful, strong communities.   Our daily performance acts addressed femicide, border control, human connection and culminated with a homemade saint procession through the center of Tijuana's Zona Rosa neighborhood with gifts of love notes, humor, chocolates, and balloons. 

Check out videos of some of the performances from Jessica Daugherty

In the fall of 2017, we collectively created our first show without Judith's direction called "Electric Awakening"/ "Despertar Elétrico", created by The Living Theatre, with 17 Brazilian artists.
70th Anniversary of the company, within the exhibition: Living Theatre Presente!
SESC Consolação - São Paulo, Brazil

From our cross country tour in 2016:
We seek a reawakening of one’s rights and rites. We traveled to over 20 cities in 21 days to present:
- Performance of Seven Meditations on Political Sado-Masochism

Camp Wonderful

I was a camp counselor for an adult summer camp, Camp Wonderful.  Leave your technology behind and embrace the opportunity to reconnect with your imagination, nature and a bunch of new friends.  It's a heavenly long weekend jam packed with music, storytelling, playshops, delicious food, swimming in the lake, dancing, camp fires, star gazing and much more!

New York Bike Dance

We are an all-women-identifying dance troupe on bicycles based in New York City. Like the Solid Gold Dancers or synchronized swimmers in a Busby Berkeley dream... but on wheels.  We use dance as a means to make bicycling and sustainability fun and inviting.  Check out our past rides and events here!  https://www.facebook.com/NewYorkBikeDance

Reverend Billy and The Church of Stop Shopping

 I was a member of the church from 2002 until 2016 after witnessing an action in the middle of Astor Place at Starbucks.  I acted as a Soprano in our 35 person choir and also Action Captain for our holy interruptions in banks, super malls and chain stores.  From the Rev:  We are a post religious church. We hold “services” wherever we can, in concert halls, theaters, churches, community centers, forests, fields, parking lots, mall atriums, and perhaps most importantly, inside stores, as close to the cash register as we can get, within spitting distance of the point of purchase.

We sing, we dance, we preach, sometimes we perform small “interventions”, invisible plays, acts of ritual resistance. We exorcise cash registers and remythologize the retail environment, we illuminate the Devil. We make media and send it out around the world. We get hassled by security guards and sometimes get arrested. http://www.revbilly.com/

Occupy The Pipeline

Occupy the Pipeline is a grass-roots environmental organization founded in 2012 to oppose the Spectra Pipeline in the West Village with creative, non-violent direct action.  We continue to fight fracked gas infrastructure and champion renewable energy methods in NY and across the country.   Get involved! 

http://occupythepipeline.com/

Beautiful Trouble

Beautiful Trouble is a book, web toolbox and international network of artist-activist trainers whose mission is to make grassroots movements more creative and more effective.  I am an active trainer and am ready and willing to be brought to your community and figure out creative tactics with you to help bring down your bad guy!  Hire me!  http://beautifultrouble.org/trainings/trainers/

Public Space Party

We are group of rabble rousers on the frontlines of New York City's battle for public space and protection of freedom of speech, assembly and expression.  We defend gardens and the commons.  We start dance parties in the streets and invite you to join us!  www.facebook.com/PublicSpaceParty

Friendship Bench Fridays

Having been inspired by the Friendship Benches by grandmothers in Harare, I'd like to start something similar. I know that folks are having a hard time lately and we don't necessarily take the time to process or always have someone to talk to. If you would like, I am going to offer every Friday (that I can) afternoon from 2-3pm as a Friendship Bench at StoneFruit Espresso in BedStuy, right when I get out of yoga work-study next door. 
I will not necessarily offer advice, but I will sit and listen to anything you'd like to share, express, talk out and just hold space for you.  
So, if you would like to take me up on it, make sure you message me in the morning, let's say by 11am, and I can let you know if the slot is filled or open.  
Friendship Fridays
2-3pm
Stonefruit Espresso

New Sanctuary Coalition

Once a week, I commit to doing one accompaniment, which means showing up and being there in solidarity with someone who has to be processed through the dehumanizing immigration system, ICE.  Find out how you can get involved.

The New Sanctuary Coalition of NYC is an interfaith network of congregations, organizations, and individuals, standing publicly in solidarity with families and communities resisting detention and deportation in order to stay together. We recognize that unjust global and systemic economic relationships and racism form the basis of the injustices that affect immigrants. We seek reform of United States immigration laws to promote fairness, social and economic justice.