Slope Weekday Events Spotlight: September 12-15

School has kicked into gear, the heat is still on, but the excellent events just keep coming. Check out an insect petting zoo, rope bondage joys, drunk science, and more.

Insect, Arachnids and Reptiles Petting Zoo with NYU Biology Student Aaron Rodriguez
When: Monday, September 12, 7pm-9pm
Where: Morbid Anatomy Museum, 424 3rd Avenue (at 7th Street)
What: This event is a celebration of animals and their many different shapes, sizes and behaviors. This particularly applies to the animals we refer to as “bugs” or “creepy crawlies,” animals that are normally misunderstood and, as a result, feared. Aaron Rodriguez’s goal is for people to become open to the idea that even creatures like cockroaches and spiders get undeserved hatred. He will supervise guests and give them guidelines to properly handle his pets in a way that is positive for both the humans and the animals.
How much: $12, tickets available online.

Brooklyn Book Festival Kick-Off Party
When: Monday, September 12, 7pm
Where: The Bell House, 149 7th Street (at 2nd Avenue)
What: Come party with us as we kick-off the 11th Brooklyn Book Festival in style with free drinks* and dancing with DJ Shiftee. An official Brooklyn Book Festival BOOKEND event, co-sponsored by Electric Literature, Literary Hub, PEN America, Tumblr & Catapult: launching remarkable writing.
How much: Free.

Pulitzer Surprises
When: Tuesday, September 13, Doors at 7:30pm; Show at 8pm
Where: Union Hall, 702 Union Street (near 5th Avenue)
What: According to the Pulitzer website, anyone can nominate anything for a Pulitzer Prize and Pulitzer Surprises takes advantage of that horrible idea. Our favorite comedians perform their submission for a Pulitzer. At the end of the show the audience will cast their vote on who deserves a Pulitzer, and then we will really submit it for a Pulitzer Prize. That winner walks away a “Pulitzer Prize Nominee.”
How much: $6, purchase advance tickets online. $8 at the door.

Key Lime Pie Brings Gigantic Ant
When: Wednesday,September 14, 7:15pm
Where: ShapeShifter Lab, 18 Whitwell Place (between 1st and Carroll Streets)
What: Funk/pop ensemble Key Lime Pie, made up of Berklee alumni, comes back to ShapeShifter Lab, and this time they’ve brought Boston based math rock fusion band Gigantic Ant to join the party!
How much: $10, at the door

Bound for Pleasure: Introductory Rope Bondage Class with Yin Q
When: Wednesday,September 14, 7pm-9pm
Where: Please, 557 5th Avenue at 15th Street
What: Are you interested in playing with teasing and restraint while holding your partner captive? Or perhaps you’d like to struggle for freedom yourself? Rope bondage can add some kink to your fantasy, or can be practiced as an artform all its own. Please is excited to offer this hands-on, two-part series for novices who are interested in learning and practicing the basic ties of rope bondage. We’re a big fan of this class. And we know what we speak of because we took it.
How much: $30-$58 (depending on single or couple). Purchase tickets online here. Tickets may also be purchased in-store. For any questions, please contact us at 718-788-6969 or email workshops@pleasenewyork.com.

Exhibition Opening of Ride by Debra Pearlman
When: Opening event on Thursday, September 15 from 6pm-8pm. Exhibit through October 2. Thursday and Fridays, 3pm-7pm, Saturdays and Sundays, 11am-7pm
Where: Gowanus Souvenir Shop, 567 Union Street between Nevins Street and 3rd Avenue (note new location)
What: A photo is like a souvenir—a memory, a memento of a brief moment in time. There’s an opportunity to present many responses to this initial photograph: an informal setting and selection of work offers the viewer the chance to experience and reflect on this process. Titled RIDE, this installation evokes movement or the implied motion of play, and the objects that support these many activities, all presented here together. Painting, photographs, works on paper, some with text, swings, and a bungee jump caught mid-air in all of these media, invite one to think about play, joy, fear, and anxiety of momentarily casting gravity aside.
How much: Free, art available for purchase.

Drunk Science: Ignorance
When: Thursday, September 15, 7:00pm (door), 8:00pm (show)
Where: Littlefield, 622 Degraw Street (between 3rd and 4th Avenues)
What: Drunk Science is an event hosted by comedians Joanna Rothkopf (staff writer at Jezebel), Shannon Odell (neuroscience PhD candidate at Weill Cornell) and Jordan Mendoza (once was pre-med). In each show, three intoxicated comedians compete to present the best scientific dissertation to a panel of real scientists.
How much: $5-$8, available at the door. Tickets available online.

Dimensions Variable: Multidisciplinary
When: Through September 24, Thursdays-Saturdays, 2:00pm-6:00pm
Where: Open Source Gallery, (306 17th Street at 6th Avenue)
What: Multidisciplinary was conceived as a response to the Open Source 2016 program which invited international artist-run projects to curate its entire season. With this concept in mind, Dimensions Variable amplified the idea and invited a select group of artist-run spaces in South Florida. The idea is not to invite them to curate special projects, but rather to include the work of the artists who run these projects as a way to honor their work and what they bring to the community. The diverse works in the exhibition reflect the practices and interests of all these “multidisciplinary” artists. They engage the community within and beyond their studio practice contributing vital programming to the contemporary art landscape in South Florida. Dimensions Variable (DV) is an exhibition space committed to the presentation and support of contemporary art. Through a collaborative exchange with artists and institutions, DV develops an exhibition program that engages the community and promotes new and experimental ideas. DV was founded in 2009 by artists Frances Trombly and Leyden Rodriguez-Casanova, who currently serve as directors. Artists in the exhibition include: Naomi Fisher (BFI); Kristen Thiele, Robert Thiele, Francesco Casale (Bridge Red Studios); Frances Trombly, Leyden Rodriguez-Casanova (Dimensions Variable); Francie Bishop Good, Michelle Weinberg, Sarah Michelle Rupert (Girls’ Club); Domingo Castillo, Loriel Beltran (Noguchi Breton)
How Much: Free

Taxidermy: Art, Science & Immortality featuring Walter Potter’s Kittens’ Wedding
When:  Through Sunday, November 6, 12pm-6pm everyday. Closed Tuesdays,
Where: Morbid Anatomy Museum, 424 3rd Avenue at 7th Street
What: This exhibition seeks to illuminate the strange and profound human connection to preserved animals through the exhibition of seldom-seen taxidermied treasures from private collections. The centerpiece of the exhibition will be The Kittens’ Wedding, the final and perhaps most unforgettable of all of the works of Walter Potter, completed in the 1890s. Equal parts perverse and adorable, and utterly spellbinding, The Kittens’ Wedding transcends kitsch through its tenderness and sensitive attention to detail. The Kittens’ Wedding was created by Walter Potter, a self-trained British Victorian country taxidermist best remembered for a series of anthropomorphic tableaux in which he posed stuffed animals such as kittens, rabbits and squirrels as if engaging in human activities. These works were exhibited for nearly 150 years until the museum he founded was divided at auction in 2003. The pieces then moved the homes of private collectors around the world, most of them never shown since.
How much: Admission to the exhibition & library is $12. Seniors and students are $8, and children 12 and under are free.

Up From Under: Video Art by Madeleine Altmann
When: Friday, September 9 – Friday, October 7. Thursdays-Sundays, 1pm-6pm and by appointment.
Where: Site:Brooklyn, 165 7th Street (between 2nd and 3rd Avenues)
What: Madeleine Altmann’s work interrogates the intersection of nature, technological change, and visual representation. Her video installations, created with reclaimed analog video monitors, re-appropriate seemingly obsolete objects, using them to explore the question of value in modern society. Often, Altmann inserts herself into the frame, disrupting the all too easy notion of a separation between nature and humanity.
How Much: Free