04.02.19

p.6 Prof. Deb Burnham

April 3, 2019 | 34st.com

p.10 New Billie Eilish Music

p.19 Coming of Age in Films

Smokes'

Then &Now

April33,,2019 APRIL Annabelle Williams, Editor–in–Chief Dalton DeStefano, Managing Editor Daniel Bulpitt, Audience Engagement Director Lily Snider, Assignments Editor Ethan Wu, Media Director

3 WORD ON THE STREET Letters I Never Sent

Sophie Burkholder, Word on the Street Editor Katie Bontje, Ego Editor Sam Kesler, Music Editor Eliana Doft, Special Issues Editor Meerie Jesuthasan, Long–Term Features Editor Angie Lin, Developing Features Editor Bella Fertel, Style Editor Maryanne Koussa, Film & TV Editor Josephine Cheng, Arts Editor Emma Boey & Sophia Dai, Photo Editors Tahira Islam & Katie Steele, Copy Editors Dean Jones & Jackson Parli, Video Editors Ben Zhao, Print Director

4 EGO

EOTW: Stephen Damianos, Deb Burnham, Dana Yi

Ego Beats: Amanpreet Singh, Michelle Shen, Sophie Xi, Caroline Emma Moore, Chelsey Zhu, Sonali Deliwala

8 MUSIC

Antlers Concert, Flume Mixtape, Billie Eillish

Music Beats: Beatrice Forman, Arjun Swaminathan, Teresa Xie, Melannie Jay, Johnny Vitale, Julia Davies, Paul Litwin Features Staff: Katrina Janco, Shinyoung Hailey Noh, Allison Wu, Srinidhi Ramakrishna, Caroline Riise, Paige Fishman, Chris Schiller

LOL

12 FEATURE

Smokes': Now and Then

15 STYLE

The Outrage, Serabol Review, Apartment Gardens

LOL 18 FILM & TV

On My Block, Coming of Age Films, Miguel in Film

21 ARTS

Shofuso Japanese House, CURATED

LOL 23 OVERHEARDS 2

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Style Beats: Karin Hananel, Allie Shapiro, Jen Cullen, Alice Goulding, Diya Sethi, Hannah Yusuf Film & TV Beats: Anna Collins, Shriya Beesam, Shannon Zhang, Zovinar Khrimian, Calista Lopez, Ana Hallman, Samantha Sanders Arts Beats: Jess Araten, Katie Farrell, Adeleke McMillan Design Editors: Gillian Diebold, Lucy Ferry, Alice Heyeh, Jess Tan, Tamsyn Brann Associates: Dannie Watson, Ian Ong, Jackie Lou, Isabel Liang, Christy Qiu, Nancy Kang Staff Writers: Liz Kim, Jordan Waschman, Anjalee Bhuyan, Shunmel Syau, Bebe Hodges, Emma Harris, Tara OʼBrien, Jessica Bao, Mehek Boparai, Zoe Young, Sophia Schulz-Rusnacko Illustrators: Anne Chen, Anne Marie Grudem, Brad Hong, Carly Ryan, Catherine Liang, Jake Lem, Reese Berman, Saranya Sampath, Jessi Olarsch, Christopher Kwok, Diane Lin, Jacqueline Lou, Sabrina Tian, Kathy Chang, Ben Joergens Staff Photographers: Sophia Zhu, Eleanor Shemtov, Alice Deng, Hoyt Gong, Sukhmani Kaur, Mona Lee, Sally Chen, Adiel Izilov, Christine Wu, Anran Fang Video Staff: Jean Chapiro, Christina Piasecki, Anab

Aidid, Deja Jackson, Megan Kyne Copy Deputies: Sarah Poss & Kira Horowitz Copy Associates: Kate Poole, Serena Miniter, Erin Liebenberg, Lexie Shah, Carmina Hachenburg, Luisa Healey, Agatha Advincula Audience Engagment Associates: Brittany Levy, McKay Norton, Kat Ulich, Emily Gelb, Ryan McLaughlin, Valentina Escudero, Samantha Lee, Nadeen Eltoukhy, Fiorentina Huang, Rachel Markowitz, Julia Zhu Cover Photo by Ethan Wu Contacting 34th Street Magazine: If you have questions, comments, complaints or letters to the editor, email Annabelle Williams, Editor–in–Chief, at williams@34st.com. You can also call us at (215) 422–4640. www.34st.com And I can't even get men to use me for my body. ©2019 34th Street Magazine, The Daily Pennsylvanian, Inc. No part may be reproduced in whole or in part without the express, written consent of the editors (but I bet we will give you the a–okay.) All rights reserved. 34th Street Magazine is published by The Daily Pennsylvanian, Inc., 4015 Walnut St., Philadelphia, Pa., 19104, every Wednesday.

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR O

n Monday of this week, I left my house on 39th and Pine and went the opposite direction of my usual route to The Daily Pennsylvanian office. I turned left on 40th, headed to Baltimore, and crossed the trolley station to get to the entrance of The Woodlands Cemetery. I had to go for class, but I wasn’t mad about it—it’s one of those places on campus I’d been meaning to visit for a while and never have gotten around to.

When I walked through the ornate concrete and steel gate, I immediately felt this sort of stillness.

Maybe it’s my obsession with Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but I’ve always loved cemeteries and found them calm. So walking around one on an otherwise hectic Monday felt somehow grounding.

I wandered along the bumpy, cobbled paths, across the squishy ground, and looked at the names of people who died centuries before I was born.

I worried a little, because that’s what you do on Mondays when the weekend’s work has piled up and you have meetings to attend and papers to finish later. I thought about the fiction piece I had to write a little, but mostly I just listened to music and walked, warm in the sun and cool in the breeze. I felt unwatched. I felt removed. I could breathe a little deeper—which is ironic, because my sisters used to tell me that if you breathed when you drove past a cemetery, you’d get possessed.

But it was a beautiful place, a historic cemetery– turned–park. I saw more dogs in twenty minutes

than I had all day. And I felt oddly refreshed.

I write this not to make myself sound morbid or like a character in a John Green novel, but to say that a little peace and quiet off–campus can do wonders sometimes.

Catch me relaxing with a picnic blanket and a good book in The Woodlands next week.

WORD ON THE STREET

word on the

STREET

These are two letters that I wrote last semester after returning to Penn from a leave of absence. I decided to publish these ones in part because I hope they can be a form of guidance for anyone who might need it—a source of strength and emotional disclosure that can sometimes be difficult to find on our campus.

However, I also hope to challenge everyone who reads them to break some of the norms on campus to which we have uneasily grown accustomed, so I have included a letter addressed to Penn. These are some of the letters that I have written to a few of the people—coworkers, peers, mentors, near–romantic interests—that I consider(ed) to be important to me.

Dear Caleb, Cal, CEB, etc.

I know you hate text messages, so I wrote you a letter instead. I was going to physically write it, but we both know you couldn’t have read my handwriting anyway (I am always too busy to master the crafts of creative expression, or so I tell myself). I decided to write because I figured it would be the best way to articulate what I’m trying to say and give you the time and space to process it. I still value letters as a mode of communication for this reason.

When I first met you, I didn’t know what to make of you or our conversations, but we each found them meaningful in a way that we didn’t understand. I’m sorry that what was once beautiful and innocent—without structure— developed into a complicated mess for both of us. Before you left for break, I asked you if you had finished the book that I gave you. And you hadn’t. I gave you the book because I could tell that you were searching for meaning in your life.

The Letters I've Started to Send A sample of letters I’ve written, but finally have the bravery to send.

By Laura Beck You told me you might read the book on the plane, and I could tell that you wouldn’t. I’m not offended. However, if you don’t plan to read it anytime soon or don’t want to, then I’d like it back. Not because I hate you, dislike you, or feel resentful about you having it, but rather because I find it meaningful, and I could give it to someone else who would actually want to read it. You don’t have to read the book if you don’t want to. That would be contrary to the book’s intention.

If you’re not going to read it, I might as well give you the gist: life is meaningless. Sort of. You can have happiness and social relationships, but eventually the destructive power of the universe comes and takes all of it away. It wipes it all into oblivion. But— there’s a giant "but"—this doesn’t mean that you just give up. The book grapples with nihilism and comes out the other side in one piece. Just because life is possibly pointless doesn’t mean your life has to be. If none of us mean anything at all, then it is also true that all of us mean everything.

It’s self–referential nihilism, and, therefore, each of us is our own God. Life is meaningless except for what we each decide is meaningful for ourselves.

I’m telling you this because I’m still confused about you— not in a romantic or platonic way. Rather, I’m confused about whether or not you think spending time with me is meaningful.

I am bringing this up not because I necessarily want a romantic relationship with you or because I want to force you to talk about your feelings. It’s not my place to tell you what to do or force you to do anything. You’re a human being that makes your own decisions, and there is so much inherent worth in deciding for yourself what it is that

Anne Marie Grudem | Illustrator

you want. I would never be so entitled as to try to take that away from you or attempt ownership of your decisions. However, I am entitled to discussions on the decisions that you make that relate to me. We can’t go back, but I don’t want to lose our friendship because you were too cowardly to troubleshoot the problem. What are you afraid of in the first place?

Being vulnerable?

So, Caleb, I respectfully ask: what the fuck are you doing?

And if you don’t know, that’s okay. You don’t have to have an answer. But we have to decide what being friends is going to look like. I’d hate to lose you because you’re scared.

Hopefully still your friend?

Laura Dear Penn, As a campus culture, we abstractly refer to the university's "problems" as if they arrived from nowhere, brought by the heavens upon us without the opportunity for respite. This is in part true— the origins of our toxic campus

started long before any of us were born or thought about. They are systemically produced structural issues: the rise of the knowledge economy, the fantasy of the college admissions market, increasing socio–economic inequality, contemporary ideological and political discourses, etc. We can blame the University, which is surely warranted—not just because of its policies, but also because the Ivy League is a driving force of the increasingly sick, maladapted American University system. However, knowing the "whys" does little to tell us "how."

"How" is always the much more important, much more difficult question to answer. Only by tracing the "how" could we possibly hope to navigate out of the enormous mess in which we find ourselves. This is not to suggest that we—all together—can suddenly "fix it." We can't. Systemic problems require systemic solutions. It's much larger than us, or even Penn for that matter.

However, we're the problem too.

We look the problem in the mirror everyday; we see the whites of

its eyes in our friends, our professors, and our administrators. The "how" on campus is in the lack of meaningful student sociality or an application process for undergraduate clubs.

The problem is endemic and intractable, produced by each one of us everyday. We are all indicted.

This is not to shame us, but rather to unburden us from the pretense of the pristine. If we ever hope to build something better for the future, we require a reckoning. We must trace the "hows" in ourselves not as a source of humiliation or guilt, but as a means of disentangling bigger realities about how our "problems" are systemically and socially produced. This is an enormous ask, and one at which we are ultimately predestined to fail. But, luckily, I am not afraid of failure. And nor should any of you be. After all, we are all failing together everyday. Our question—the question for all of us students, professors, and administrators alike—then becomes: how best to fail?

Ambivalently yours, L

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EGO

Ego of the Week:

Stephen Damianos

Meet the Penn senior who has dedicated his life to empowering refugees.

– Amanpreet Singh –

Name: Stephen Damianos Hometown: North Hampton, New Hampshire Major: Majoring in political science and minoring in journalism Activities: Founder of Penn Undergraduates for Refugee Empowerment (PURE), founder of the Refugee Employment Task Force, Sphinx Senior Society, Kite + Key, Perry World House Student Fellow, Transfer Student Organization 34th Street: Why did you decide to come to Penn?

Stephen Damianos: I actually didn't get into my top five schools when I applied to college, and was devastated. It felt like everyone around me was going where they wanted to go, and I was going where I had to go. I went to Hamilton College for a year, and tried to make the most of it, because I realized that going anywhere was such an amazing privilege because so many people don't even have that. But ultimately, it wasn't the right place for me—I knew after three weeks that I wanted to leave. I worked really hard to be able to come here, and I really wanted to go to a city, and I was really drawn to a lot of things Penn had to offer. It was just the most amazing decision I had ever made. There wasn't even one second where I looked back and thought that I should have gone somewhere else.

Also, my best friend from home transferred here in the same year, and we’ve been roommates ever since, so that’s just been really incredible for me.

Street: Why did you decide to major in politics?

SD: I can't even go near 4

numbers—I will start sweating and get anxious when I have to even calculate a tip when getting drinks or dinner. So that really quickly knocked out anything in math. I wanted to be PPE, but I realized there's an E in that, and that the E has math in it. And also I really wanted to make sure that what I was studying would have practical implications, and to be able to use it to affect some kind of change in the world. I felt like studying politics would allow me to do that.

Street: When did you realize that working on refugee issues was so vital?

SD: My family is Greek, and I've spent every summer in Greece. As I got older, I started watching how this island transformed from a tie to my culture and my ancestors into a country decimated by something they couldn't control, and by so much sadness and hurt and loss. And so there was a bit of a personal tie to it. It's frustrating to say that sometimes you don't act on something until it feels close to home, but that was

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part of it. Another part is that there are so many issues going on in the world right now, and I feel so helpless with them.

Something like HIV, AIDS, or cancer—I don't know anything about science. I can't cure cancer. I can’t stop the war on Syria. I can't stop hunger. But I can teach someone how to read English. I can tell them their rights. I can empower them to get a job. I can write a resume with them. There are so many little things I can do to chip away at this giant problem, and I can mobilize people to do the same.

Street: Why did you decide to start PURE (Penn Undergraduates for Refugee Empowerment)?

SD: When I came to Penn there was no undergraduate organization that existed to empower refugees, which blew my mind, because approximately 900 refugees had re–settled in Philly that year alone. It felt

nothing about it. So I started PURE and enlisted an amazing executive board, and we kind of just built it from scratch. Now we have a bunch of volunteers.

We have translating, fundraising, advocacy events, movie screenings, and educational events. We play soccer with refugee kids once in a while, and we transit on active legal cases that have legal documents. We Skype into refugee camps and translate. We also presented at the United Nations twice, which is really cool.

Street: What was it like presenting at the UN? SD: It was crazy. I presented at the United Nations my junior year and I spoke about the importance of student advocacy in refugee issues and the ways that we can mobilize universities and all of their resources to make maximum impact within this field. It was an out–of–body experience because there were thousands of people there, and everyone was just sitting there listening and caring. What was even cooler than being at the UN was being in a space where everyone wanted to make the world bet-

showed up in Greece and was like "I'm ready and who needs me?" I went around to various NGOs until one felt like they could really utilize my skill set. I did a lot of employment work, so working one–on–one with refugees and writing resumes and CVs with them to help them gain employment.

I did a lot of work to remove refugees who were forced into survival sex work from that situation or provided them with contraceptive[s] and information about how to be safe in that type of employment. I also did a lot of legal work, advising people on how to gain asylum in certain countries, safe access to travel routes, how to not get arrested, and writing letters to the police to remove people from detention. It was a hugely formative summer, but really difficult to come back from, because I came back from working with people who didn't even have a home to stay in. They slept in the streets, and they had only one shirt and no shoes, and I came back to Penn where people were complaining about their heating in the Radian. It was really difficult to

There are so many little things I can do to chip away at this giant problem, and I can mobilize people to do the same. like such an immense gap to me that students at Penn say that they're going to be future leaders of the world, but this is one of the most pressing issues of the world and yet we're doing

ter and figure out how to make that happen.

Street: What did you do during this summer in Athens?

SD: This past summer I just

experience that, and to recognize that I do that too—we all do that; it's part of being young and part of being privileged. It just forced me to consider what we have and what matters.

EGO

Street: Do you have any moments where your work felt really real or meaningful to you?

SD: I recently wrote my senior thesis in political science, studying refugee mobility and travel documents in Europe.

I dedicated it to four refugees that I met in Greece, because these are people who have been forced to leave their countries and leave their homes. They have been beaten by the police and they've had to go in tiny boats over oceans. It felt like my work really had a meaning, and that it was for them. That was a very proud moment for me—when I was able to hand in my thesis and have their names on it. It was so important for me to include their names, because their names are so often excluded from spaces of privilege. To me, the hundred pages that I wrote meant nothing if I couldn't include their names and I couldn't bring them into this space, especially because many of them were in college when they became refugees, and they would ask me about my life. I would see such love for learning in their eyes and envy when I would speak about Penn, because there's nothing they wanted more than to go to school. Towards the end of the summer, I met with each refugee I was working with and asked them what they wanted most, and hopefully it was something that I could do. And I expected that they would say, "I want to go home" or "I want to go back to my country." All of them said, "I want to go to school."

And it was so eye–opening to me that these people who have nothing, and who have been bombed out of their homelands didn't respond that they wanted peace, but that they wanted pencils. They wanted to learn, and they wanted a stable job.

They wanted to feel of use and worthy. It just stopped me in my tracks. I couldn’t breathe in that moment. And it made me come back to Penn so aware of the ways I need to use this de-

gree, and the ways I need to soak in every second of this place. It's our world, but it's also a world that so many people can’t even come near.

Street: I think that’s all our official questions. Is there some part of you that we haven’t been able to capture here?

SD: I guess I am very much slotted in the human rights sphere, but I think there are so many other parts of me as well.

I love movies. Every year, when the Oscar nominations come out, [I] watch every single nominated film, and I make a huge spreadsheet of predictions.

I get really into it, and if my friends ask me if they can watch it with me I say no because I need total silence. I love travel.

I'm really trying to go all over the world. Eventually I want to be an elected official, so I'm just kind of all over the place.

I'm really passionate about equality, about the LGBTQ+ community in particular. I love food—it's been a goal of mine to go to a new restaurant or bar in Philly every week. You’ll almost never see me in Smokes.

It was my New Year's resolution to not go into Smokes in 2019, because we have this amazing city full of places, and I want to explore all of them before I go.

The other thing is, I'm obsessed with socks. I have a collection of crazy socks [points to the ones he’s wearing now]. These aren't too crazy—they're just owls and moons. I really try to spice up every look with crazy socks that get people staring at them. I'm often in formal dress for various things, so usually I try to have the least matching socks in the outfit, and have it be like 'boom!' Everyone says that shoes make the man, but I think socks make the person. Oh, and another really important thing is that I'm a twin. My twin brother doesn't go here, but I always have to say that. We're fraternal, and he's my favorite person in the entire world, and I miss him every second.

LIGHTNING ROUND What is your favorite pair of socks?

I have two favorite pairs of socks. One pair is just pineapples, and I think they're so excellent because pineapple is an underrated fruit.

They make your mouth tingle, and they're all so pretty and they're great in smoothies, so I love having them in sock form. Another pair of socks has neon patterns, and it’s essentially what it’s like if you’re in a club: all of the lights go in different shapes, and it's just crazy neon everywhere. It's the kind of thing that you look at and it almost hurts if you look at it too much.

What is your favorite movie?

Slumdog Millionaire.

What class would you recommend to all Penn students?

I would recommend Political Communication with Kathleen Hall Jamieson if you have tough skin and are okay with crying in class.

What is the best bar in Philly?

Writer’s Block Rehab is the best bar in Philly because it's modeled after a library, and the menus are in books, and not a lot of Penn people go there, so it's a little getaway. It's okay, I'm leaving now, so everyone can get in on the secret.

There are two types of people at Penn...

Those who know how to answer this question, and those who don't.

If you were a building on campus which one would you be?

I would be Starbucks, because I feel like I give back to Penn a lot, but I'm also incredibly basic.

The Student Side Hustle Because everyone needs beer money

JEFFREY A. MILLER CATERING IS HIRING! Servers Bartenders Campus Recruiters

Apply online! estratex.com/ Jobs/Jamshop

Flexible schedules, set your own hours!

Jeffrey A. Miller (W’82) founded JAM Catering in 1980 as a sophomore!

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EGO

the Penn English Department's Deborah Burnham talks about literature, the Penn English Department, and running a writing workshop for cancer patients.

– Chelsey Zhu – Megan Kyne | Photographer

Maybe it’s because I’m thinking about becoming an English major that I’m so entranced when Professor Deborah Burnham speaks. Maybe it’s because I already love writing. But I have the feeling that Burnham could talk to anyone and get them to love books just as much as she does, which—by the way—is a lot.

When I first meet Burnham, we get to talking about the class she’s teaching next semester, ”Or-

phans Making Good: 19th–Century British Literature,” which focuses on novels with an orphan protagonist. She immediately explodes into conversation about the books she can’t wait to teach.

Great Expectations, she begins.

“It starts out in a graveyard, and a little boy is looking around and thinking, ‘Where are my parents?’ He’s looking for his parents’ gravestones. And all of a sudden, somebody who turns out to be a criminal picks him up.”

Burnham mimics the face of the small, scared boy, holding up her left hand to demonstrate how the criminal would have yanked him up by the collar.

Occasionally, as she’s gushing about a novel, she’ll preface its ending with a “spoiler alert”— which I find incredibly charming, considering that the book was probably published centuries ago. Having been a graduate student and a professor at Penn English for 45 years, Burnham

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lives and breathes literature. A poet and fiction writer, Burnham feels motivated to write because she can connect with others who may have had similar experiences or introduce a completely new experience to someone else.

And Burnham is all about fostering that understanding in her students, which starts with access. In the last forty–something years, she has seen Penn English transform from a group of professors who only taught staples like Old English or 19th Century American Literature to a dynamic team giving students the opportunity to study graphic novels, Latinx poetry, queer literature, Italian films, and so on.

She’s also passionate about building enthusiasm for literature in young people, which is part of why she decided to write a novel. “The thing about being a young reader is that you plow through books pretty fast,” she says.

To feed this “enormous appetite” that kids have for reading, Burnham is working on a book about a young woman working in a draft resistance office during the Vietnam War. As she describes her protagonist, her words and gestures bring the character to life: the young girl becomes entangled in her politically complicated job, family drama involving a very odd aunt, and a quiet but sweet love story.

Burnham dedicates her time to teaching others besides Penn students through the workshop,

"Writing a Life." The goal of the course is to allow people people formerly or currently diagnosed with cancer to freely write about their experiences. They were looking for people to assist with workshops and, at times, physically help the students write. She joined and agreed to help. After the founder left the group, Burnham began leading the sessions, which now occur around twice a month at the Kelly Writers House and the Perelman Center for Advanced Medicine.

At each session, Burnham picks a prompt from poetry, fiction, or memoir, often written by someone who has or has had cancer. The participants then work individually before coming together at the end to share their work. Unlike in her regular teaching job, Burnham stresses to these students that “this is not school.”

“Spelling doesn’t count,” she says. “This is not an assignment; it’s an invitation." In that group, cancer patients and survivors get a non–judgmental space to document their experiences and relate to others, a sentiment that goes back to Burnham’s own motivations for writing.

“Why do I write?” she says.

“Because it’s fun. Because it makes me feel better. Because I’m really interested in exploring my own experience verbally and seeing if it has resonance in other places.”

“Plus,” she says enthusiastically, “I just love writing.”

EGO

Dana Yi: the

in the World This Penn sophomore found her first Rubik's Cube when she was eight, and now she travels the world competing.

Mona Lee | Photographer

- Michelle Shen What can you do in 5.37 seconds that can make you a world champion? Dana Yi (E '21) is the fastest female Rubik’s Cube solver in the world. She’s participated in 62 competitions, and won 25 bronze, 19 silver, and 11 gold medals. She’s traveled all over the world, spending weeks exploring places from the Eastern seaboard to all across Europe, making international friends in the cubing community along the way.

So how did it all start?

Dana recalls finding an unsolved Rubik’s Cube in her basement when she was eight or nine years old. It was broken and all the stickers were peeling off, but her parents gave her a new one that Christmas. She began learning how to solve a 3x3x3 cube on YouTube, and over the course of ten years, she practiced solving more complex cubes until she could solve a 7x7x7 in under three minutes.

“It’s a slow process because at the beginning you’re learning just sort of the bare minimum for how to solve it, and then over time there are kinda like shortcuts. So you’re not solving it any differently—you’re just taking shorter steps to do multiple things,” Dana explains, “Especially at the beginning, if you look at my times, it’s a fairly exponential decrease, but then I think around thirteen,

twelve, eleven seconds, I sort of hit a block and then it took me probably a year to get over that.

Right now my average is around seven [seconds].”

Now as a delegate for the World Cube Association, Dana officiates competitions and helps organizers submit results for different participants. In past years, she has competed in France, Spain, Austria, and Germany, and her upcoming competition will be in Australia.

Dana notes that while participants face off against each other during the conference, some of them have become great friends and even travel buddies. After competitions, they spend time exploring monuments and eating delicious local food. As someone who has learned French for seven years, Dana spent her free time during the World Championships in France talking with locals and absorbing French culture.

“I actually have a lot of international friends and friends from around the country who cube, and we’re close also outside of cubing, but it was just incredible that I was able to meet these people through cubing.”

The individualized nature of cubing taught Dana some important life lessons that she still applies today. While Dana admits she was intensely competitive in high school, she likes to

adopt the mentality she learned from cubing when it comes to success in college.

“It’s been such a huge part of my life for such a long time, so I’ve learned a lot of things from it. I think the biggest thing is just like, you’re competing against yourself,” Dana reflects.

“At the beginning when I was

really slow, I more so enjoyed the experience than trying to get first place.”

Dana has spent a decade of her life cubing, and she went from third–to–last place to the top in her category. However, she cares less about her placement in the competition and more about how the gradual

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process of self–improvement and diligence led her to develop patience and confidence.

“If you think of the cube as an obstacle, most people are like, ‘oh man, it’s impossible, you can’t do it’ or whatever. But it’s really not.” Dana says, “Don’t be scared of anything that might seem impossible or daunting.”

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MUSIC

Me lan ni e Jay

THE ANTLERS BRING A Q U I E T, E M O T I O N A L N I G H T TO WORLD CAFE LIVE

usic |M

Beat

'Hospice' got an acoustic treatment for a fully captivated audience.

MELANNIE JAY

In 2009, indie rock band The Antlers released Hospice, a concept album using the love story of a hospice worker and a patient with terminal bone cancer as a metaphor for one of frontman Peter Silberman's old relationships. "To an extent it's autobiographical," Silberman said in an interview with The Village Voice, "but I guess the best way to say it is that there's a few ways to lose someone. It's not always through death, even if it resembles death." The message resonated with fans and critics alike: Pitchfork awarded the album with a "Best New Music" stamp upon its release

before ranking it #37 of the best 50 albums of 2009, while Beats Per Minute crowned Hospice the best album of the year.

The Antlers would go on to release two more albums, 2011's Burst Apart and 2014's Familiars, as well as the EPs (together) and Undersea in 2011 and 2012. After the 2015 Familiars tour, however, there was radio silence from the band.

Silberman revealed to Paste in 2017 that he had been diagnosed with several acoustic conditions permanently impairing his hearing, and that The Antlers were "just in a big period of flux … with everybody follow-

ing individual paths and resettling." Later that year, when a Twitter user inquired as to how long the band's hiatus would last, they responded "probably forever … sorry dude."

Forever came to an end, however, when the Antlers announced that, on the album's ten–year anniversary, they would be repressing Hospice on white vinyl and embarking on an acoustic tour playing the album in its entirety. That tour included a stop at World Cafe Live in Philadelphia on March 27.

The downstairs has a capacity of only 300, and those seats sold

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out the day tickets went on sale. The 300 lucky audience members were placed at long rows of seats perpendicular to the stage, which helped to create an atmosphere of community and allowed strangers to share tables and converse between sets about the band they all love.

Tim Mislock took the stage first, performing half an hour of self–proclaimed “ambient slurm jazz” from his 2017 album Now Is The Last Best Time, inspired by his mother's work caring for her husband after his Alzheimer's diagnosis. Both acoustically and thematically, Mislock served as a suitable apéritif for the incoming set.

As it turned out, Mislock would return later that evening, playing electric guitar for a triumvirate of Antlers that consisted of Silberman singing and playing acoustic guitar, and drummer Michael Lerner, equipped with only a snare drum and series of sticks and brushes. They played seated, never stopping to speak other than a quick "Thank you," after a particularly hearty round of applause. Instead, they were committed to the music, which was a different kind of melancholy with the acoustic setup: Rather than the almost dreamlike, ambient sound on the recording, the guitar–focused set allowed Silberman's voice to come to the front. This grounded the ethereal album and allowed the audience to feel every cutting line even more viscerally. Once the final chords

of "Epilogue" faded away, the crowd vaulted into a standing ovation.

More and more artists recently are using the same strategy, performing an album front to back on a certain anniversary: singer–songwriter Dar Williams did a "Return to Mortal City" in 2016, twenty years after her sophomore release, and Streetlight Manifesto jumped from a 2017 Somewhere in the Between ten–year anniversary tour to a celebration of Everything Goes Numb's fifteenth birthday the next year, with a short break in between for Keasbey Nights to turn twenty. As far as these albums go, however, Hospice is perhaps the most suited to being performed in this fashion.

The audience was in a state of suspended animation, enthralled in the music before them and driven to tears at least once. Silberman took a moment to thank everyone who supported the Antlers through the years. He told Pitchfork upon the album's release that "Hospice has a happy ending— the takeaway point is not necessarily the damage done, but the self–determination." This is the energy that was felt as the Antlers left the stage on what might be their last tour. A melancholy pervaded the venue after their final bows—the knowledge that this had been a one–time opportunity to hear Hospice performed this way. But in it was a glimmer of light, celebrating the concert's duration more than its end.

ld

FLUME NAI L S A FRESH SOU N D IN H IS

Photo by Ev aR i

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MUSIC

by 2.0 CC / / i

mi x tap e

The Australian DJ and producer creates beautifully labyrinthine sounds in his new mixtape.

PAUL LI T W I N

Harley Streten, otherwise known as Flume, has never shied away from an ambitious sound. Leaping onto the scene in 2013, Flume immediately captured hearts with his unique remix of Disclosure’s “You & Me,” and has never played it safe since. His new mixtape, Hi This Is Flume, marks another step in the DJ’s path of experimentation and bold production, filled with creative musical atmospheres and mesmerizing beats front– to–back.

“Ecdysis," the first song, is a perfect introduction to the mixtape. The song itself is fairly short, like many songs on the mixtape, clocking in at just one minute and forty–five seconds. However, the shortness of the song means Flume packs a shocking array of production into an extremely short period of time. He varies between glittering production interspersed with thick, almost trap–like drum kicks and electronic warps. The result is jarring, as the production fluctuates between atmospheric sounds and a quick reverberation back down to earth when the deeper bass comes crashing in.

The subsequent track, “High Beams,” shows how Flume’s production can run circles around sub–par vocalists. The featured rapper, slowthai, ruins what is arguably the most well–produced track on the mixtape. It makes us wonder how truly excel-

lent the song could have been had Flume chosen to make it an instrumental, or—better yet—brought back one of the features from his previous album, Skin, such as Vince Staples, Alunageorge, or Tove Lo. Regardless of slowthai’s mediocre performance, Flume’s production on “High Beams” should not be overlooked as another brilliant example of a sound fluctuating between heavy–hitting imposing beats and glittery, near–ethereal sounds.

If “High Beams” could have potentially been the best song on the mixtape, the song it would have had to replace from the top spot is “Jewel." Flume masterfully weaves melodic sounds together into what feels like an almost–mystical environment of synthesized melodies.

Flume’s elysian soundscapes in “Jewel” are similar to the mixtape's remix of “Is It Cold In The Water?,” featuring SOPHIE’s vocals and Ephrom’s co–production. Flume yet again balances dreamlike production and haunting vocals with hard–hitting electronic drums, crafting a stark contrast unlike any other in his previous works.

While “Jewel” and “Is It Cold In The Water?” represent Flume’s ability to mix soft and hard electronic chords, his production on “How to Build a Relationship,” featuring JPEGMAFIA, is purely cold–blooded. Flume creates

a perfect beat for JPEGMAFIA’s surgical raps in yet another contender for best song on the mixtape, and once the kicking beat really falls into place about fifteen seconds in, both Flume’s production and JPEGMAFIA’s raps are impossible to ignore.

“Vitality” marks one of the most bizarre production pieces on the entire record, a track which combines elements of what seem like classic hip–hop beats and distorted percussive instrumentation. Clocking in

at just one minute and forty seconds long, “Vitality” is one of the many songs that is short, but extremely deep in sound and melody. Flume manages to squeeze something unique out of every second. Similarly, “Daze 22.00” marks another jarring contrast between haunting music and sharp electronic drums.

“Spring,” featuring Eprom, is another brilliant example of quick–shifting sounds between technological percussions and choral harmonies.

As “Spring” is the final song, it leaves the listener with a poignant impression of Flume’s goal for the sound of the album.

Flume truly achieved his goal for an experimental sound on Hi This Is Flume, rather than aiming for commercial appeal. No track on Hi, This is Flume will be a Billboard Hot 100 hit, and that may be exactly what Flume was going for—an instrumental challenge rather than an easy way to top the charts.

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after releasing her debut album,

BILLIE EILISH still belongs to teenage girls

On WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO? Eilish sounds exactly like the quirky 17–year–old we wish we were.

beatrice forman

Five months ago, Street wrote that Billie Eilish "belongs to teenage girls," citing her young fanbase and her seemingly boundless energy as evidence that, while talented, Eilish certainly belongs to a distinct generation. Fast forward nearly half a year later, and Eilish drops a time bomb of a debut album filled with enough angst, existentialism, and self–doubt to transport even the most hardened of us back to tenth grade.

WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO? belongs to high school girls. And it can belong to us too, so long as we approach it with the adolescent sparkle that’s buried beneath our de-

sires to appear professional and serious—whatever that means.

The album opens with “!!!!!!!,” shorthand for the frenzied excitement that characterizes Eilish’s life. She’s seventeen and goes to Chanel fittings.

She studies for her driver’s test in between performances on late night television. She has a full–length album but also uses Invisalign, which she hates. “!!!!!!!” encapsulates exactly who Eilish is in 13 seconds: a brace–faced teenager teeming with creativity and the kind of airy vocal talent that can fill any room, but a brace–faced teenager nonetheless. In this track, she takes off her Invisalign, which signifies the beginning of something

greater—almost adulthood.

Eilish nosedives right into “bad guy,” which sounds like club music for people who stand in the corner sipping their drinks. Bass heavy and vocally quiet, Eilish taunts the listener with measured strategy and silliness. She’ll have the upper hand in any relationship, but she also might seduce your dad. It’s lyrics and moments like these, wrought with the capricious flourish of an Urban Outfitters’ cap emblazoned with “daddi," that remind us of Eilish’s youth.

She’s unfiltered, which, while refreshing, calls for the occasional cringe.

Cringeworthy moments pepper the overall solid de-

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but. There’s “xanny,” a lullaby where Eilish’s voice is soft and syncopated to sound like a siren lulling us to never, ever, try drugs. It feels like a lame attempt at role–model–ship, a track placed on the album to garner the approval of parents everywhere. It’s impersonal, filled with tenth–grade health class platitudes, and lacks Eilish’s authenticity. Meanwhile, “wish you were gay” and its underlying sentiment reeks of something that should be left to a group chat with your closest friends. Singing with melodramatic vibrato against a pulsating base, Eilish yearns for her crush to be gay because he rejected her.

While relatable, it feels so high school. Sometimes, Eilish wields her youth masterfully. Other times, it swallows her whole. “wish you were gay” represents the pinnacle of teenage naivete, where rejections are pasted over with fantasies. Eilish is for high school girls because she still is one, and feels one with them. She likes the things they like, peppering references to The Office in randomly. Michael Scott’s “The Scarn” opens yet another bop about a totalizing crush, giving the song a disjointed, impulsive mood.

That being said, WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO? is speckled with brilliance. Eilish is at her best when she’s introspective, churning out songs that feel like a sequel to Judy Blume’s Are You There God? It’s Me,

Margaret. “all the good girls go to hell” mixes a searing critique of religious dogma with a playful tone, ringing with melodies that sound plucked from a carnival. Eilish’s voice is soulful and contemplative, lifting at the end of each chorus like it's a question. The album finds its groove in these moments—confrontational and skeptical, Eilish pushes mainstream pop to a place that only Gen–Z could.

It’s a place filled with questions and alternative visions of the unknown that melt into one another. “bury a friend,” the album’s most explosive single, demonstrates this best.

With a minimalist beat and Eilish’s near falsetto flourishes, the song demands the listener’s full attention. Both haunting and arresting, it begs listeners to join Eilish in her catharsis, confronting the monsters that define our relationships.

Here, Eilish belongs to us just as much as a gaggle of high school girls. She’s confronting the notion that all relationships are temporal, existing as tiresome give–and–takes.

That anxiety has no target age group.

The bottom line? WHEN WE ALL FALL SLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO? reads like Tumblr archives from high school, with embarrassing confessions, vague attempts at comedy, and artistic genius.

Like the nostalgic website, Eilish belongs to high school girls, but that doesn’t mean we can’t borrow her.

MUSIC

EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT J.I.D BEFORE SPRING FLING At just 28 years old, J.I.D has revamped Atlanta rap.

teresa xie Miguel might be the headliner at this year’s Spring Fling on Saturday, April 13, but it’s J.I.D, the show's special guest, who deserves the spotlight as an East Atlanta rapper who has been rising up in the music scene for the last two years. Street takes a look into what J.I.D brings to the table and why we should be excited for his performance at Spring Fling.

Destin Choice Route's stage name, J.I.D, comes from his grandma's nickname for him, which describes how "jittery" he was when he was young. Right after releasing his first mixtape in 2010, J.I.D joined the music group Spillage Village, which was started by Atlanta hip–hop duo EARTHGANG at Hampton University, Virginia, where J.I.D was studying at the time. Spillage Village’s collective is composed of EARTHGANG, J.I.D, Hollywood JB, JodxnBryant, Marian Mereba, 6LACK, and Lute. Their music takes from jazz, soul, and hip–hop, creating a sound that is engaging and immediately identifiable.

In 2017, J.I.D released his first full–length album after signing onto J. Cole’s record label Dreamville earlier in the year. The album is packed with Spillage Village members, from EarthGang to 6LACK. Working more in collaboration with J.Cole, J.I.D. also opened for him on his 4 Your Eyez Only Tour in

North America and Europe.

However, it’s J.I.D’s most recent project, DiCaprio 2, that has received the most positive critical acclaim, as it acts as a subtle transition from his old style. DiCaprio 2 was released in 2018 on Nov. 16, with an extended list of collaborators such as A$AP Ferg and BJ the Chicago Kid. The influence of Atlanta rap can be felt in J.I.D’s music, through his powerful lyrics and effortless raps. He attributes his influence to specific Atlanta artists such as Gucci Mane, T.I., and OutKast.

J.I.D's higher pitched tone brings a different dimension to his tracks, adding a pop of personalized style. There’s a real melody throughout J.I.D’s music, bringing a stark contrast to the typical monotonous string of words over a heavy beat that many other artists tend to follow. In an interview with Rolling Stone, J.I.D states that he tries not to glorify drug deals and illegal acts because of his experience growing up around that scene. Even J.I.D’s lyrics reflect this idea, as they tend to focus on having fun and joyous experiences. Given that J.I.D's studio recordings are already full of hype and energy, we shouldn't expect anything less from his live performance.

Songs to play on repeat before Fling: "151 Rum," "NEVER," and "Off Da Zoinkys."

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SMOKES': THEN AND NOW A night shadowing a Smokey Joe's bouncer with a look back to Smokes' past.

By Allison Wu | Photos by Ethan Wu

I

t’s 10:10 p.m. at Smokey Joe’s on a Thursday.

Choyce Bostian III (C ’20), wiggles an ID and holds it up to the light before handing it back to a girl standing at the door. “I can’t take this.”

Choyce, who works as a bouncer, hands the card back to the girl. She gives Choyce an incredulous look and lingers outside for a few seconds before walking away with a friend. It’s just ten minutes into his four–hour shift, and this is the third fake ID he’s seen.

“Just like that, there’s three,” he mumbles, and hunches down in his bar stool, ready for the rest of the night.

Choyce is a football player; he’s over six feet tall and can pull off a stern look when he’s angry.

It’s already cold outside and he’s wearing two layers and a cozy vest, but his shift has just begun and he’s still making friendly conversation with another staff member. He doesn’t seem tired yet.

“Welcome to Smokey Joe’s, est. 1933, ‘The Pennstitution,’” reads a sign as I walk in. Though it was founded over nine decades ago, Smokey Joe’s, famously known as Smokes’, maintains its legacy as one of Penn’s most well–known bars. In his 1975 commencement address, President Gerald Ford proclaimed: “[Penn consists] of 16 institutions of higher learning and personal enlightenment—17 if you include Smokey Joe's.”

A night here in 2019 isn’t much different than the experiences of past patrons and employees who frequented the bar decades ago. The quirky characters, inclusive environment, and tight–knit staff are all features that define Smokes’ and have made it a beloved campus staple, both then and now.

“Smokes’ has always been the Pennstitution,” Heidi Tandy (C ’92), a regular at Smokes’ during her time at Penn, tells me over the phone. “It was probably the Pennstitution when my mother went there, and it’s because of its accessibility, its mellow attitude, and its acoustic acts that we used to have back there.”

Indeed, there’s light chatter and lighter music playing as I walk inside ten minutes later. A man in his 50s sits at a table in the corner, sipping on

a large beer and watching the game with his daughter, who looks like a student. Five guys, also probably students, laugh loudly as they greet each other near the entrance. Around the bar, there are men in slacks and wrinkled button–down shirts, their blazers tossed on chairs nearby. An older couple walks around and looks closely at the sports pictures hung up on the wall.

A waitress walks by wearing a denim jacket and black jeans, holding a receipt in one hand and an empty beer bottle in the other.

Jaimee Marshall (C ’85) recalls her time as a waitress at Smokes’ in the ‘80s while she was an undergrad at Penn. She particularly remembers the outfits, which were not especially flattering on her. They comprised of navy khaki pants, a blue button–down shirt, and a red and blue striped tie. I sense her distaste over the phone.

Jaimee remembers chatting with patrons, sometimes even sitting down with guests. Once, she was caught stealing a french fry off of a patron’s plate.

Pat Ryan, one of the owners, gave Jaimee a look that made her stand up and get back to work. “I was probably having a little bit too much fun,” she says.

Sarah Keating (C ’85), who worked with Jaimee — at Smokes’, remembers the characters and the regulars that she found hilarious.

She tells me about Magic Bob, who owned a UniMart convenience store down the street and would come in for a couple of drinks every afternoon.

There was also a guy named Gary, who the staff called Puppet Man. Sarah says Puppet Man didn’t talk as a person, but came in with a bag of puppets that had names, like Booboo Kitty.

“He would be like, ‘Booboo Kitty would like a beer’ and, ‘Booboo Kitty would like a hamburger,’ and you'd have to take his order by a puppet,” she says.

Once, a homeless man nicknamed Mike the Nut, who helped clean up the bar every night, gave Sarah a birthday present in a brown paper bag. “In it was a gun … I opened the bag and of course, I touched the gun. Now I’ve got my fingerprints on some random gun.”

Then there was Wilbur, who worked at the

[Penn consists] of sixteen institutions of higher learning and personal enlightenment seventeen if you include Smokey Joe's.

— President Gerald Ford, 1975

Choyce Bostian III outside Smokey Joe's 1 2 3 4 T H S T R E E T M A G A Z I N E A P R I L 3 , 2 01 9

Paul Ryan, one of the owners of Smokey Joe's movie theater next door, and Hoagie, who was a bartender at Smokes’ that drank himself into a stupor every night. The nicknames were half the fun, she tells me. “It was just Magic Bob. Wilbur, I guess, was his name, but did Wilbur have a last name? Probably,” she says.

“It wasn't work. It was literally a party every night.”

At 11:20 p.m., Choyce stands up from his seat near the entrance and positions himself near the door so that “no one can squeeze by.” Inside, Smokes’ is hosting a Penn Hillel Quizzo event, but they’re not letting any more underage students inside. Choyce rejects another ID. “Are you serious?” the girl asks.

Choyce nods. “Have a good night.” He throws a peace sign in her direction as she walks out of the door.

Like Jaimee and Sarah, Choyce enjoys talking to patrons. He’s headstrong and vocal—important traits for a bouncer. Plus, the bartenders and waitresses who work there have become his “bar family.”

Choyce often works at Smokes’ from 10 p.m. to

2:30 a.m., sleeps for fewer than three hours, then wakes up in time for morning football practice.

But it’s “good money” that he needs to pay rent.

Also, working for Paul Ryan and his family, who’ve owned the bar since 1952, has really been a “character grower.” He tells me that Mr. Ryan is a good businessman who cares a lot about what he does. His son, also named Paul, is “kind of dry and kind of dark,” but he makes the job “interesting.”

Paul, the son, is managing the place tonight.

He runs around the bar, takes his new puppy for a walk, then sits by the entrance to make sure that Choyce isn’t letting underage students slip in.

“I’m just a glorified babysitter,” he mutters.

Everyone I’ve talked to has mentioned the Ryans—how the Ryans made both their employees and their patrons feel welcome. Corinne Keller (W ’85) and Randi Rosenberg (C ’85), who also worked as waitresses at Smokes’ alongside Jaimee and Sarah, both still include their jobs at Smokes’ on their resumes and LinkedIn profiles.

Randi, a lawyer who’s worked at many firms, says that to this day, the Ryans are probably the

best bosses she’s ever had. They had perspective, especially considering they were running a business where their employees were almost all around 19 years old. They made their staff feel comfortable.

While working there during her senior year, Corinne asked Pat and Paul Ryan (her bosses at the time) to write a recommendation for a job. As a prank, they showed Corinne a fake recommendation describing how awful she was.

Sarah remembers the loyalty she felt toward the Ryans. She tells me about a period of time in which she worked with a bartender who stole money from the bar. He would charge a patron $35 for 10 shots but would go to the cash register and ring in $10, and keep a tab in his head of how much money he had scammed. At the end of the night when Sarah counted her tips, she made two or three times more on the nights that she worked with this one guy.

“Randi and I were so torn because we didn't want to steal from the Ryans but we were kind of complicit in it because we knew, so we ended up telling them and they watched him and they fired

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him,” Sarah says. “But that's how loyal you were to these people because they were so good to you.”

Just like Choyce, Sarah recalls the whole staff being close to each other. One year, they played an employee softball game on the grass across from Smokes’. A man stole her backpack from the sidelines. She began chasing after him onto 40th Street.

“The next thing you know, there’s like 30 bouncers on top of this guy,” she says. “Everybody was so protective and if anybody was giving you a hard time at the bar, the bouncers were right there. It was just such a great place to work.

I can't say one bad thing about it.”

To this day, Corinne, Sarah, Jaimee, and Randi are still good friends. In my interview with Randi, she predicted what the other waitresses would say about their time working at Smokes’.

“Sarah talked a lot about the characters there, Jaimee talked about herself interacting with the patrons and how she'd sit down at the tables and eat all of their food. I'm predicting exactly,” Randi says. “Corinne and her sister, they needed the money during the time, and it was probably really lucrative.”

By 11:30 p.m., the Hillel Quizzo event is in full swing, and it’s much louder than it was an hour and a half ago. The em-

cee for the event is about to announce the winner. “Shh,” she breathes into the microphone, but it doesn’t get any softer.

The DJ for the night sits with Choyce, talking to Paul and waiting for the Quizzo event to end. She’s sipping a Red Bull, which looks green in the fluorescent light. At around 12 a.m., underage students who were attending the Quizzo event leave, and the DJ takes her place in the booth. A few moments later, “Hollaback Girl” by Gwen Stefani blares and patrons stomp to the beat.

Melissa Jacobs (C ’92) worked as the first female DJ at

his song. Every once in a while he would come out from behind the bar and everyone would get quiet,” she recalls. People didn’t expect such a big bartender to have a beautiful voice.

Starting at midnight, cars roll up in front of Smokes’, and students hop out of their Ubers wearing high heels, leather jackets, black dresses, and suits.

There are date nights today, and Smokes’ is the place to be afterward.

It’s not that crazy tonight, Choyce says. He recalls his one of first days working as a bouncer at Smokes’ during Erin Express, a St. Patrick’s Day bar crawl. Choyce and another staff member tell me about the students who passed out in front of Smokes’ before even getting inside. They remember another time when someone was thrown through the porta potties set up in front of the bar during the Erin Express.

Melissa tells me that she always kept a flashlight and a baseball bat in her DJ booth.

Once, during Erin Express in the early ‘90s, someone from another school came behind the booth and picked her up, put her over his shoulder, and tried to walk out of Smokes’ with her.

Of course, the bouncers “were all over him.” After that, she bought the baseball bat to protect herself and the flashlight so

It wasn't work.

It was literally a party every night.

— Sarah Keating C '85 Smokes’ in the early ‘90s. She remembers when Paul bought a karaoke machine, which, back then, she thought was the “tackiest thing ever.” It ended up being fun, though, when people would go up and sing while she took a break from the DJ booth.

In particular, Melissa remembers an incident in which a bartender told her that he could sing.

“He used to sing 'When Doves Cry' by Prince, and it was like

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that she could signal for help to the other bartenders or bouncers.

Likewise, Choyce emphasizes the importance of safety. “It’s a college campus, but I’m still a bouncer,” he says as he analyzes the gradient behind an ID photo and checks how perfect the signature is. He’s especially annoyed when people come back once or twice after he’s already rejected their ID. The Ryans are strict about preventing underage drinkers from entering during Smokes’ late hours, since it’s such a big liability. In the early ‘90s, Melissa says, the Ryans implemented a camera system that recorded students saying, in their own words, that they were of age. “That deterred a lot of people. People were much more cautious about using their fake IDs.” By around 1:30 a.m., the dance floor empties. Students linger around the bar and some stumble out with their friends or their dates while the music pounds loudly. Choyce shakes my hand and gives me a tired look as I get ready to leave.

Melissa remembers how she would time the songs so that the last two were slow songs, “because if you were going to hook up, this was your chance.”

"Nothing Compares 2 U" by Sinéad O'Connor and "Everything I Do" by Bryan Adams were her go–tos.

Some aspects of Smokes’ have changed since the ‘80s and ‘90s. The layout is different and the place is slightly more polished. But Heidi says the bathrooms are still “disgusting.”

Heidi tells me that she was one of the two or three kids on campus who had a video camera in the early ‘90s. She still has very low quality videos of her class on Hey Day morning with fluffy hair and red shirts. She remembers how Smokes’ was happy to host them at ten in the morning, even though they were spitting pieces of styrofoam hats all over the floor.

“I guess they still do that, and I love that that's something that's eternal about Smokes'.” she says. “No matter what era you're from, you're able to have this place.”

ST YLE

Philadelphia's Feminist Fashion Phenom Express yourself and your feminism with these ethically sourced gems

Tucked away in between tourist shops and a furniture store on 3rd and Arch Streets, a block from the Betsy Ross House, The Outrage has a slightly unassuming facade.

Lacking a formal sign or awning, it embodies the “brick and mortar” aesthetic. Yet, step inside and you’ll find yourself immersed in a room filled to the brim with progressive and feminist merchandise, apparel, accessories, and more. Though the space is not that much larger than an average–sized classroom, I still spend upwards of thirty

front? “We have you covered,” The Outrage's Philadelphia City Lead Ashley Brown says with a laugh.

Brown, who is enrolled in the Wharton MBA Program for this fall, said The Outrage started during the 2016 presidential election cycle, capitalizing on Hillary Clinton’s run as a reactionary platform to some of the rhetoric stemming from Donald Trump’s campaign. When Trump uttered the phrase “such a nasty woman” in reference to Clinton, media—both social and national—went into a frenzy.

minutes browsing the various racks and table spreads.

T–shirts with phrases like “Believe Women,” “This Land is Whose Land,” and “Impeach the Motherf*cker” cover the walls. The window sills are lined with votive candles with faces of various historical female figures affixed to each.

In need of snarky feminist socks, a Ruth Bader Ginsburg action figure, some new laptop stickers, or a baby onesie with the phrase “Families Belong Together” across the

While many reacted in anger, Rebecca Lee Funk, Outrage founder and CEO, saw an opportunity—in the following days she launched a series of “Nasty Women Unite” apparel items online, all of which sold out.

As the platform gained momentum, The Outrage found a space for a pop–up store, and ended up becoming the official merchandise partner for the 2017 Women’s Marches. “We had lines wrapped

Mona Lee | Photographer

Alice Goulding

around the block, sometimes four hours long, almost every day of those six weeks [of the pop–up]” Brown said. Since then, The Outrage has also partnered with the 2018 and 2019 Women’s Marches, the March for Science, and the March for Our Lives.

The Outrage now has two physical locations: one in D.C., and one here, in the Old City neighborhood of Philly, which opened in October 2017. Their philosophy is simple: “We’re on a mission to raise one million dollars for progressive organizations,” Brown said. They do so by donating with every purchase to progressive–leaning organizations like Planned Parenthood or the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).

Some shirts are tied to specific organizations, and a portion of the proceeds made from their sales goes directly to help that cause.

Their marketing is on point as well, as, for the past two years, they’ve continued to serve up line after line of minimalist and modern–looking clothing pieces that can be incorporated into everyday wear. These don’t look like your run–of–the–mill campaign shirts, and that’s precisely the point, Brown notes.

“There was a lot of feminist apparel being made that was either produced completely

by rich white men profiting off of the message but were not giving back to any of the organizations the whole message was supposed to be about,” Brown said, referencing RedBubble and other online outlets. “Or there were smaller shops,” she continued, “but they weren’t really aesthetically on point—cutesy, lots of flowers, and not really simple.”

The Outrage falls somewhere in the middle—a small, semi–locally owned clothing brand that prides itself on its start–up roots, but still is producing apparel that rivals that of national fast fashion retail spots. “We get the message across at an elevated design level,” Brown said.

Moving forward, Brown hopes the Philadelphia branch of The Outrage might one day have a community building or space that mirrors the one recently opened in DC, where they could host community events, like poetry readings, book signings, or even book and knitting circles. This space could also provide a venue for grassroots activist groups and campaigns to meet privately. “We want to be [a] community building. We want to obviously sell our apparel to outfit the resistance and so that people can wear their values, but we also want to give people platforms

to speak.” In the meantime, Brown hopes The Outrage can partner with more organizations as they have for marches and national events in months past, but on a more local level, and with a volunteer or pro bono element to it.

Since working at the Philadelphia location of the Outrage, Brown said that nothing has fulfilled her more than seeing people’s reactions to the store. “I have so many tourists coming in here from blue pockets of red states, like Arkansas, Texas, Indiana—who visibly breathe a sigh of relief when they walk in,” Brown said. In this way, Brown continued, The Outrage creates a sort of safe space for visitors—be they residents of Philly or tourists from elsewhere.

“Yes, these shirts are super cute, designed really well, ethically sourced—all things that are important to shoppers nowadays,” Brown concluded, “but also, they let people express themselves when they might not otherwise be able to, and I just think that’s amazing.”

The Outrage is located at 321 Arch Street and is open from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Thursday to Saturday, and 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Wednesday and Sunday. It's closed on Mondays.

A P R I L 3 , 2 01 9 3 4 T H S T R E E T M A G A Z I N E 1 5

ST YLE

TL;DR: A modern but true– to–its–roots Korean restaurant in Center City.

Hours: Mon: Closed Tues—Thurs: 11 a.m.—2:30 p.m., 5 p.m.—11 p.m.

Fri—Sat: 11 a.m.— 2:30 p.m., 5 p.m.—2 a.m.

Sun: 11 a.m.—9 p.m.

Location: 1326 Spruce Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107 Price range: $$

Seorabol: True to Its Korean Roots The place to go if you want to try your first bibimbap.

Shinyoung Hailey Noh

Shinyoung Hailey Noh | Features Staff Writer

I remember the first time I went to a Korean restaurant with my American friends.

As we walked out of the restaurant, one asked: “So, was that legit Korean food?”

The food there was OK, but it wasn’t the kind of Korean food my mom makes— it was definitely Americanized. Their kimchi wasn’t spicy enough, and they filled fusion dishes with ingredients familiar to non–Korean diners. In other words, the restaurant was pulling its

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punches.

Chris Cho, executive chef of Seorabol in Center City, wants to change that. He believes in serving real Korean food to everyone. “Cho does not Americanize his menu,” Michael Klein writes in his Philadelphia magazine article “How Korean cuisine is moving to downtown Philadelphia.” After reading, I went down Spruce Street to experience it.

With its clean–cut tables and a small bar, Seorabol feels much more modern than its parent location in North Philadelphia. Try to sit away from the main wall, though; the way the light flickers can hurt your eyes.

Seorabol had many more banchan, or side dishes, to offer than the typical kimchi and pickled radish. Among its five banchan, the highlights were the radish kimchi and the sausages. The potato salad and the soft tofu were good as well.

However, I’ll skip the haemul pajeon (seafood pancake) next time. It was more mushy than crusty because it had a bit too much oil. But some good news: Their galbi

(marinated short rib) was not oily, even though galbi tends to have this problem. It was just sweet enough and came with an assortment of ssamjang (spicy dipping sauce), scallions, garlic, and pepper.

For all you dolsot bibimbap (stone pot bibimbap) lovers out there, Seorabol is the place to go. If you don’t love bibimbap already, why not start now? A standard bibimbap is a healthy vegan dish, and it’s delicious! It’s hard to find good dolsot bibimbap outside of Korea, but I found it in Seorabol.

I thoroughly enjoyed their haemul dolsot (spicy seafood hot stone bibimbap). I let the rice rest in the stone pot to give it a crunch. The bibimbap was flavored well, and the seafood was fresh.

I’d recommend Seorabol for people who want to get good bibimbap. I’ll go back for more Korean food that tastes like it’s from across the Pacific.

ST YLE

HOW TO START A GARDEN IN YOUR APARTMENT Test your green thumb from the comfort of your home.

Jennifer Cullen

We can finally walk outside without having our appendages go numb, so you know what that means—it’s almost spring time! And there’s nothing that makes it feel like spring like flowers blooming. Unfortunately, the confines of an apartment don't provide much space for planting a garden. But with some creativity you can make even the smallest space a little more green.

Where to Plant One thing everyone knows about plants is that they need sunlight. Ideally, this would be 6 to 8 hours a day. Try finding a windowsill or balcony area where this would be possible.

If your space doesn’t have that, then you may have to try growing a plant that requires less sunlight.

If you’re planting high up, wind will be a little bit of a concern. Make sure your containers are heavy enough to withstand the elements, or buy a wind block.

What to Plant You have so many options for what you can plant, even in a tiny space. If you’re looking for something extremely easy, succulents are always an option since they only need to be watered about once a month.

If you want a little bit more of a challenge, try growing some herbs or greens, like parsley, basil, kale, or arugula. You’ll have to water these more frequently to keep the soil damp, but they’re pretty resilient plants.

As an added bonus, you can use them for cooking.

How to Plant There are plenty of nurseries and gardening supply stores not too far from campus, which will provide you with all you need.

I personally recommend Urban Jungle in South Philly. They have a multitude of seeds, soils, and different kinds of pots that will meet your aesthetic needs.

An organic soil or potting mix will probably work best, since they’re lighter in weight and allow water to pass through easily.

But don’t think you have to spend a lot to have a garden— pretty much anything can be used as a pot as long as it can hold soil and water, and seeds usually run for less than a dollar.

How to Keep Your Plants Alive Give them food and water!

Even if your outdoor space gets rain, it probably won’t be enough to keep the plants healthy. You’ll need to test the soil by putting a finger two to three inches deep and seeing if it feels dry. Additionally, unless

you buy a soil with fertilizer included, you’ll need to feed your plants by fertilizing them about every other week.

Even though apartments may not provide enough room for a full spring garden, there’s always a sunny corner where you can plant some seeds and watch something amazing grow.

Live music • Film • Dance • Theater Art Education • Community

Intricate Machines with Aizuri String Quartet

Apr 3, 2019 @ 7:30 PM Admission is $15 at the door Come see three rising NYC stars at The Rotunda!

The award-winning Aizuri Quartet will perform at The Rotunda as part of their Intricate Machines tour. The Aizuris show how exciting and vital the modern string quartet can be, and for those who love classical music and all of the contemporary arts, this is not a program to miss! For more details, see: www.imaizuri.com

Bad Sex and Other Problematic Analogies by Stephanie C. Kernisan

Apr 5, 2019 @ 8:00 PM Admission is $15 Alternatively titled “confessions of an unintentionally whitepassing, mixed, fat, queer, feminist, switchy witch.” Bad Sex explores heartache and healing with humor and humility. This show is part essay reading, part stand-up routine, part musical event written and performed by Stephanie C. Kernisan.

Philly BalkanFest 2019

April 8|Gregory • April 9|Gregory • April 10|Harrison 7 PM

Van Pelt Cinema

7 PM

Van Pelt Cinema

7 PM

Apr 7, 2019 @ 2:00 PM Tickets @ http://phillybalkanfest2019.bpt.me Announcing the first ever Philadelphia festival of Balkan music and culture! We have assembled a full program with events all afternoon, taking over the whole building with non-stop music performances in both the concert stage room and the spectacular dance hall beneath the great rotunda, plus food trucks, dance workshops, and more spanning the Balkan folk traditions, and beyond!

Heyer Sky Lounge

As an alcohol-free/smoke-free venue, The Rotunda provides an invaluable social alternative for all ages.

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FILM&TV

Don’t Miss Classic Movie Essentials at the Ritz Five this April

Get out to Old City to catch classic film showings at everyone’s favorite indie theater.

Zovinar Khrimian With the days growing longer and spring in the air, there is no better time to start enjoying Philadelphia outside our academic hamlet here in University City than now. If you’re heading out to Old City for a little distance, any Penn film buff would tell you to drop in for a couple of hours at the Ritz Five, grab some tea and cookies, and enjoy a great movie.

However, if nothing among the selection of independent films that are typically playing catches your eye, the Ritz has classic film showings every Tuesday at 7 p.m.

When you’re in the mood for a little weekday getaway as the semester winds down, you can catch these showings throughout the month of April.

Photo provided by Ritz 5

April 2 — The Lady Eve This 1941 comedy follows Charles, an awkward snake expert and heir to a brewery fortune, who, while aboard an

ocean liner, becomes a would– be con victim. Instead of falling prey to the con artist Jean Harrington, however, the two fall in love aboard the ship. As

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a result of this complication, a strange tale of disguises and deception unfolds. The Lady Eve is highly acclaimed for its comedic style, setting the bar for decades of romantic comedies to come.

April 9 — Chinatown Chinatown is a 1974 neo– noir mystery, often heralded as one of the greatest films of all time. It begins with a woman hiring a private investigator, J.J. Gittes, who specializes in cheating spouse cases, to investigate her husband. Things are not all as they seem as Gittes finds himself in the middle of a web of lies and murder. This thriller would certainly bring a little grit and mayhem to your Tuesday evening.

April 16 — Dr. Strangelove Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove is frequently cited as one of his best films. This 1968 Cold War Era staple is a black comedy thriller that satirizes its subject matter so well it has been lauded as one of the greatest political com-

edies of all time, certainly deserving of a big–screen viewing. Whether you’re a huge Kubrick fan hoping to catch one of your favorites on the big screen or just looking for something new, let this one ease you out of Fling weekend madness.

April 23 — The Godfather Part II With finals creeping up on you fast, the tail–end of April is a great time to head out east to the Ritz and watch this incredible piece of cinema. Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather Part II stands up to the groundbreaking original, and stars Al Pacino and Robert de Niro.

With a 200–minute runtime, you better clear out your night for this 1974 gangster epic.

With the streets of Philadelphia hopping once again, there is no excuse not to spread your wings before summer is upon us. If you find yourself craving a little weekday adventure, grab the SEPTA and make an evening in Old City into a event with classic movie showings at the Ritz Five all month.

FILM&TV

Growing Up and Out in Film On never aging out of coming–of–age.

Shannon Zhang

The label “coming–of–age” shoos in familiar high school settings, expository narration, and the young teen who inevitably breaks out of their introductory shell by the end of the film.

Give or take certain details, such a description emerges as relatively accurate for many cherry–picked movies of the genre.

There’s The Edge of Seventeen, the first movie to pop up from a Google search of “coming–of– age movies,” Eighth Grade, Bo Burnham’s recent middle school dramedy, and Lady Bird, a 90th Academy Award Best Picture nominee. The list goes on.

There are a lot of coming– of–age movies—a result of their assumed universal relatability, or maybe a targeted ploy to squeeze profits and high ratings out of an audience of young, impressionable teenagers? Regardless, their prevalence generates common tropes that seem to be almost necessary in a story that follows a growing youth. The tropes include first times (with drugs, alcohol, and/or relationships), rites of passage (graduation, puberty), and a struggle with some sort of existential angst. Slap them all together into a moderately developed screenplay and you get something that’s bound to be alright to its targeted audience, even without an ounce of originality. The Way, Way Back, my defining summer ’13 movie, follows an awkward teen who finds a father figure at his summer job to replace his current father figure, a mean Steve Carrell. There’s nothing revolutionary about the movie, but I (at age 13) still thoroughly enjoyed it.

Of course, there’s also the stuff at the bottom of the barrel—movies that use the easily replicable coming–of–age formula and still get it wrong— like The Kissing Booth and Si-

erra Burgess Is a Loser. Slightly misogynistic, a little bit creepy: whereas good enough coming– of–age is heartwarming but predictable, bad is unbearable to

about growing up. And a genuinely good coming–of–age film is more than just relatable.

I recently watched The Perks of Being a Wallflower again for

CC BY 2.0 Photo by: Juno OST

watch and almost disrespectful on principle.

But all movie genres have their own bad apples and coming–of–age is not all mediocrity and cringe. From the singular characteristic of “growth” that defines the coming–of–age genre comes original stories and struggles that push preexisting boundaries rather than settle in them. Juno: a 16–year–old girl unapologetically takes on pregnancy. Or City of God: Rocket lives amid an ongoing turf war, constantly watching and waiting for an opportunity to get out. While trope–y themes of insecurity and confusion are found in these two movies, Juno and City of God are memorable due to bold premises and strong character development: because as much as we can all relate to a shy teenager finally finding the courage to ask the girl out or stand up for himself, there are other stories to be told

the first time since late middle school, during which I revered the movie as the genius peak

of all entertainment. Returning seven years later, I found myself smiling at more than crying over the movie’s ups and downs. Charlie, going to a football game alone? First kisses, not knowing how to say no, and royally fucking everything around him up? Hey, me too. And the multiple horribly cringe–worthy lines (“Welcome to the land of misfit toys.”) left me groaning—now just a morsel of nostalgia, The Perks of Being a Wallflower is no longer the heart–wrenching story I loved in middle school.

The themes of coming–of– age media are universal: the protagonist is small and insecure, looking for some landmark to stake his identity in. We’ve all either been there, are there right now, or are getting there. Yet every individual has his own set of experiences that shapes his viewing of a coming-of-age movie differently. I love Whisper of the Heart—is it because Shizuku shares the same haircut and career–oriented worries

that I did several years ago, or because it’s an all–around well– executed movie? I’m willing to argue both, but not all movies can receive the same treatment: The Perks of Being a Wallflower was good and is now highly mediocre.

Enjoying a regurgitated teen movie about overcoming shyness is no crime. But like every coming–of–age protagonist, we’re all growing, and many of us out of the grips of teen angst.

Sure, you can return to your own summer ’13 movie for nostalgia, but coming–of–age is also a sprawling genre of innovative entertainment. It embodies movies about teenagers who grow up in environments drastically different than your own, movies that twist the genre into something strange and surreal (Donnie Darko), and movies that are about unassuming teenagers, but are also incredible in their own right (Boyhood): there’s something here for you, even if you’ve aged out of your school–aged misadventures.

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FILM&TV

Double Threat: Spring Fling Headliner Miguel Acts, Too Before you get Flung, check out these two films featuring Miguel.

On Monday, March 18, the Social Planning and Events Committee (SPEC) announced that R&B singer Miguel will headline the 2019 Spring Fling Concert on Saturday, April 13. The Afro– Mexican artist is well known for his Grammy Award–winning song "Adorn" and self– identifies as part of a new wave of R&B, falling in line with artists like Frank Ocean, the Weeknd and Elle Varner.

If you don't immediately recognize Miguel as an established R&B musician—don't worry, you're not alone—you will definitely recognize him for the infamous viral video of the "Miguel Leg Drop."

Miguel, who was performing his hit "Adorn" at the 2013 Billboard Music Awards, attempted to jump across the

stage and accidentally crash landed on two audience members, knocking one into the stage and hooking his leg on the face of another. Video of the incident instantly inspired tons of internet jokes and GIFs, and solidified Miguel's place in meme history.

But what most people don't know is that Miguel—music career and internet fame aside—is also an actor. He's been featured in two movies since 2016 and has worked alongside big names like Zoe Saldana, Elle Fanning, John Boyega and Will Poulter. His roles in both movies are admittedly small, but it's evident that his talents go beyond just singing and songwriting.

Miguel's Hollywood debut came with Live By Night, a 2016 gangster period film

directed by and starring Ben Affleck. Set in the Prohibition Era, a group of Boston– born gangsters, led by Joe Coughlin (Affleck), run a trans–national rum operation.

While transporting and distributing illegal booze from Tampa, Florida to the East Coast, Joe must navigate through a turbulent world of competitive mob bosses and powerful KKK members. Miguel plays Esteban Suarez, a Florida–based, Cuban businessman who produces and sells

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an important component in rum to Coughlin and other competing gangs. Miguel adopted a thick Cuban accent and a slicked–back hairstyle to portray Esteban, who he said he feels very connected to because of their similar interest in art and the value they both place on family. What the film lacks in momentum and unfulfilled potential it makes up for with compelling individual performances from its A–list cast (including Fanning, Saldana, and Chris Cooper) and the stylish and sexy '20s world, created by stunning costumes and production design. Live By Night may be mediocre, but there's enough interesting subject matter (who doesn't love sex, drugs, and money?) to hold onto, and the role of Esteban Suarez certainly gave Miguel a satisfactory acting debut.

Miguel's second role was in Detroit, a 2017 crime film directed by Kathryn Bigelow, who also directed The Hurt Locker and Point Break.

The film is based on the true events of a 1967 instance of police brutality against black

teenagers during the night of the 12th Street Riot. Detroit focuses on the beatings and murders of black teenagers— some of whom were members of the soul band The Dramatics—by white Detroit police officers. The film portrays the brutality and violence of the '60s in such a realistic manner that it feels more like a documentary than a drama. Miguel plays Malcolm, a member of The Dramatics, and makes a brief cameo during a musical performance later in the film.

While his role in Detroit is much smaller than his role in Live By Night, Miguel said he felt inspired by his part in the film as it featured young and upcoming talent, and sought to bring attention to pertinent subject matter.

Maybe you're a die–hard Miguel fan and have already purchased your Spring Fling concert tickets. Maybe you've decided to skip this year's concert to save a few bucks.

Either way, you can celebrate Spring Fling this year by watching Miguel perform both onstage and on the silver screen.

ARTS

This Tea House and Garden reflects the history of Japanese culture in Philadelphia Today, I am at peace. Breathing deeply, the sun on my face, I watch a waterfall flow into a pond, watch parents and children feed koi. As I write, I sit on the steps of a Japanese tea house. I am just miles from campus, and although it doesn’t feel like it, I am still very much in Philadelphia.

March 23 marks the start of Shofuso Japanese House and Garden’s 61st season in West Fairmount Park. Administered and maintained by the Japan America Society of Greater Philadelphia, Shofuso was “designed by architect Junzo Yoshimura in the style of a 17th century estate house, and built in Japan in 1953 using traditional techniques and materials.” Shofuso translates to “Pine Breeze Villa." Walking the grounds while surrounded by trees, sounds of rushing water, and traditional Japanese architecture, the translation feels apt.

Before entering Shofuso Tea House, visitors must remove their shoes. Throughout the garden, educational signs explain the significance of Japanese customs. “It is common practice in Japan to remove one’s shoes when entering someone’s home. The custom promotes cleanliness and protects traditional flooring which may be easily damaged by footwear.” I place my shoes alongside the shoes of many other visitors, not in lockers, but in shared, open cubbies. I learned that “Japanese cultural norms place a strong importance upon the difference between spaces. This entryway is a border between the outside world and the inner world.

The act of removing your shoes can be a symbolic casting–off of the worries and troubles (as well as the dirt) of the outside.”

Courtesy of the Japan America Society of Greater Philadelphia

As I walked through the tea house, I noticed naturalistic paintings covering the back walls. A nearby sign explained that Hiroshi Senju created twenty murals for Shofuso, titled ‘Waterfall.’ An acclaimed traditional Japanese painting, or nihon–ga, artist, Senju is “one of Japan’s most revered contemporary artists.”

Renowned for his unique approach to modernism expressed through the traditional method of Japanese painting, Senju spent hours “observing Shofuso at different times to select pigments that reflect the colors and atmosphere of the building and garden.” The resulting murals exemplify both his signature style as well as the unique setting. After visiting Shofuso in 2004, Senju said, “I can sense the presence of Japan.”

Visiting Shofuso allows for a new cultural experience within Philadelphia’s city limits. The Japan America Society of Greater Philadelphia describes Shofuso as “reflect[ing] the history of Japanese culture in Philadelphia, from 1876

to present day. They note that “Shofuso was again named the third–ranked Japanese garden in North America by the

Journal of Japanese gardening in 2016." An active tea house, Shofuso hosts scheduled tea ceremony demonstrations

Jess Araten

through local branches of the Urasenke and Omotesenke tea schools. Additionally, Shofuso offers the opportunity to study tea ceremony with Urasenke Philadelphia, with two beginner’s sessions scheduled twice a year. Shofuso’s location in Fairmount Park typifies the Japan America Society of Greater Philadelphia’s mission: to “inspire mutual curiosity, understanding, and collaboration between Japan and the Philadelphia region.”

After visiting Shofuso, I plan to return and attend a tea ceremony. An encounter with Japanese art and culture is just a short drive away.

Shofuso Japanese House and Garden is open March 23—October, Wed—Sun. $8.00 tickets with Student ID.

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ARTS

Penn Dance's 'Curated':

From Freshman Inspiration To Senior On–Stage Performance

Penn Dance Company's graduating class bridges two forms of art for its spring independent show, 'CURATED'.

Katie Farrell

Photo Courtesy of Gracelynn Wan

was at the Barnes, and thought it would be a good place for a promotion video. Then, she began to think it would be an even better idea for a full show.

Previous graduating classes have been heavily composed of STEM majors—last year’s show, titled de | construct, was inspired by exploring what happens when things break down and come apart. Erisa and Emily share that this theme is definitely a departure from the past Ethan Wu | Media Director show. Yet, Erisa assures me that, “This theme gave us freedom Erisa and Emily Johnson “it is only a theme, it doesn’t to choose inspiration. Art gives (E’20) are sitting next to each change the heart of the compathe show a more cohesive feel. other on the first floor of Housny or how we dance.” Johnson We are all from different dance ton Hall. Behind them is a brick adds, “we are all artists first, so it backgrounds, we bring different wall and fireplace that I have does not matter what you study, styles, and being inspired by art never seen lit. Erisa is sporting you are there to study dance.” ties the show all together,” shares a black, long–sleeve with a CUThis show was much earlier Erisa Nakamura (C’19).

RATED Penn Dance patch on than their previous show dates, and the Company only had eight weeks to prepare. For each piece, the dancers rehearse once a week, so there were only eight rehearsals total.

On Saturday, I sit down in the Exp.2/23/12 4/11/12 Exp. wooden seats at the Iron Gate Theater. The crowd is full of exFor Fast Delivery Call 215-386-1941 traneous chatter and enthused friends. As the lights dim, and the voices hush, the screen proj4004 chestnut street | (215) 386-1941 ects its first art piece, and the dancers begin.

Exp.2/23/12 4/11/12 Exp. After speaking about Erisa and Emily's favorite pieces, I For Fast Delivery Call 215-386-1941 rightfully anticipated my own favorite piece. As Georgia O’Keefe’s ‘Sky Above Clouds IV’ appeared on the screen, I moved to the edge of my seat.

WITH THIS AD Emily let me know beforehand that the dance is “based on VALID UNTIL 4/30/19 the philosophical idea of bad faith—the idea that people end student discount with I.D. | order online @ newdelhiweb.com | closed mondays Exp. 4/11/12 the top left. Her encouraging nods are coupled with expansive smiles. Emily is wearing a white shirt also with black Penn Dance text, layering the tee with a black and white turtle neck.

Every spring, the Penn Dance Company creates an independent show with a different theme decided among the graduating class. This year, the Company put on the show CURATED, which was based on works of fine art, artists, or art movements. Before each piece, the screen was projected with a work of art, and the dance following is inspired by the choreographer's interpretation of the art.

The theme was inspired by Erisa's ideas. She's had the idea since freshman year, when she

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up doing things for the wrong reasons, that they feel they have to, so they are no longer free as a person.” Erisa added: “the choreographer thinks that the opening up in the painting shows release from the idea of bad faith.”

At first glance, the painting is reminiscent of fractured pieces of ice floating above water. Yet, on closer inspection, there's a horizon of baby pink and hues of purples coalescing with orange. The vertical skew reminds us we that are moving upwards, thereby separate from our pasts.

At the same time, the disjunction between the clouds—welcoming slits of blue—replicate the ability to disconnect from our histories—still keeping a careful eye, but from a higher distance.

The swift, practiced movements of the dancers communicate exactly this point, of opening up and taking control, coupled with vulnerable emotion. The creativity, freedom of expression, and inspiration shines through. The dancers each bring their own to the dance, but within the same cohesive theme.

Erisa ends with: “Penn Dance is filled with artistically talented people; whenever I see someone else’s choreography I am just blown away, it’s indescribable.

People put so much emotion and passion into the way that they dance.”

Emily joins her, smiling: “I am so impressed that anyone could come up with those things, and watching it enacted by the dancers is really beautiful.”

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A P R I L 3 , 2 01 9 3 4 T H S T R E E T M A G A Z I N E 2 3

OPEN LATE & LATE NITE DELIVERY

R O F G N I K O O L K? R O W E M I T T FULL OR PARHIRING! WE’RE UR LOCAL STORE CONTACT YOR DETAILS! FO

Domino’s

TM

SUN-THURS: 10AM - 2AM • FRI-SAT: 10AM - 4AM

WE MAKE ORDERING EASY! CALL DIRECT OR CHOOSE YOUR ONLINE OR MOBILE DEVICE

215-662-1400

4438 Chestnut St.

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Smart Tablets Phones

215-557-0940 401 N. 21st St.