This week on Hard NOC Life, Shawn and Keith recap the week in Nerd Pop, by running down what happened at Comic-Con and diving into the rise of the Black Auteur and Afro-Surrealism.
Continue reading “Hard NOC Life: Mystery Science Theater Oakland”
I was caught making ice sculptures while wearing my X-Uniform in 5 Pointz, Queens, and someone asked why I would risk exposure.
I wear my X-Jacket when outside of the Academy to empower myself, and to remember that being mutant is a global phenomenon — our gifts, largely and widely, will go unrecognized as our existence is fundamentally iconoclastic in an otherwise conformist world.
I especially wanted to visit the 5 Pointz Academy after having been painted over white.
Continue reading “Calling All Mutants: An Open Letter from Professor Mex”
The world lost a titan of the Black Arts Movement when the poet Amiri Baraka passed away today in Newark, New Jersey after several weeks of hospitalization. Baraka was 79 years old.
On twitter, honorary NOC Saladin Ahmed wondered if Baraka was the first poet to reference superheroes in his work.
"Who has ever stopped to think of the divinity of Lamont Cranston?" –I wonder whether Baraka was the first poet to reference superheroes?
— Saladin Ahmed (@saladinahmed) January 9, 2014
The poem Ahmed was referring to, “In Memory of Radio,” comes from Baraka’s first collection of poetry, Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note, which has been reprinted below. In it, Baraka — then still known as Leroi Jones — uses The Shadow to bookend the poem:
