The Owl, the Bear, the Ladybug, and the Bunny
As Scooter’s Homo Eruptus show closes this Sunday, March 17, I reflect on a moment right before the opening which took place on Valentine’s Day.
Scooter had mentioned it would be fun to attend the opening wearing costumes, and so we started coming up with a plan. He wanted to dress as a bear; I decided I’d be an owl. Van opted to go as a bunny, and Joel as a ladybug.
A couple of hours before the opening, Scooter went to Joel’s apartment and painted Joel’s face. I got there soon after and put on the owl costume to get used to it. Van arrived a few minutes later. Scooter and he tweaked their costumes by cutting the sleeves off a shirt Scooter was going to wear over his bear suit and putting the sleeves on Van’s bunny suit for visual continuity.
Scooter accompanied a fully-costumed Joel to Atlas to grab a bite. Van and I were still adjusting our costumes, so we stayed at Joel’s. As it was almost time to head over to Howl! Happening, Scooter came to get Van and I and put on his costume. Joel would meet us at the gallery.
So, costumes in place, we headed on to the street. It was fun to be encased in masks as in capsules traveling through the East Village. We had reminisced earlier about how much fun we had trick or treating in Ocean Grove when I wore a sheet with holes as a ghost and Scooter wore a Freddy Krueger sweater.
Hand in hand, we walked down Second Avenue, people saying things like ‘you guys are awesome.’ We laughed and said ‘hello’ and ‘excuse me,’ and a marvelous sense of elation came over us…we were having a magical moment. Scooter said he hadn’t had this much fun in years.
And so the fairy tale of The Owl, the Bear, the Ladybug, and the Bunny came to life…as captured in this photo Bubi took, in front of Scooter’s painting Vesuvius, Will You Be My Girlfriend?
