Okay, so we’ve slacked off a little (hey, we’re technically on break, so that’s okay, right?) and haven’t finished the recap of last month’s session with Femme 6. But you can catch her—along with other Dr. Sketchy’s models, specifically Maria Bella, Paco Fish, Marla Meringue, and Roma Mafia—tonight at Mobtown Theater, in Poetry in Pasties. Here’s a bit about the show:
There will be gravity-defying feats of breathtaking beauty, original writings by the performers themselves, retro beat poetry with a twist, classical poems re-imagined in acts of striptease, comedy and drama, a special tribute to Charm City, and many, many more surprises to stimulate you– intellectually! 😉 All of this for only $10?? WOWEEEE!
Write this down where you won’t forget it:
THIS SUNDAY, August 14th
DOORS AT 8:30, SHOW AT 9!
only $10 at the door, and there’s booze!
Mobtown Theater at Meadow Mill
3600 Clipper Mill Rd
Hampden, Maryland
Do yourself a favor and come satisfy your craving for a mind-body experience like no other. Poetry in Pasties!
We’re sure your weekend could use a little more culture and hotness, so end it right with some literary striptease.
So, since we’re been taking our sweet time to put up the recap of Femme 6’s session with us, consider this the last call for sketches of our lovely model from that session, folks. Scan (or shoot with your camera phone) your drawings and send them to us at drsketchysbaltimore(at)gmail.com, or post them on our Facebook page’s wall. If you haven’t liked our page yet, do yourself a favor and go do that now: we update that page more often than the blog, so if you’d liked us already, you would have gotten a reminder about Poetry in Pasties before now, and you would have seen photos from our last session. (You could have also seen photos earlier if you followed us on Twitter.) But, since you’re reading this blog and we like you, here’s a photo from that night.
Other awesome stuff happening this week: Maria Bella will be a guest performer at Trixie & Monkey’s Summer Camp show at the Creative Alliance, and Baltimore Comic Con is next weekend. If you’re going to be geeking it out at the con, be sure to stop by Paigey’s table in the artists alley to say hi and check out her work. And we’ll update the Calendar O’Fun with more stuff as we learn about them, just so you aren’t starved of burlesque goodness while we’re taking a breather.
Speaking of our summer break, you might be wondering when it’ll be over. We’ll be back in little less than a month, on September 12, with Dahlia Derriere as your muse for an evening we’re calling “Dahlia Derriere Does Desert Dames”. In case you missed it, here’s a photo from her last session a little over a year ago:
See the rest of the photos plus artwork from that session here. We’ll post a flyer here soon—but it’ll probably be on our Facebook page quicker (hint, hint). Check back this week for that and our Femme 6 session recap, but while you wait for the photos, remember to see Femme in the flesh at Poetry in Pasties tonight.
Another week, another Dr. Sketchy’s Baltimore —wait, no it wasn’t, we had beautiful belly dancer Rio and a father-humping snake! Â It was a night of mind-numbing, bone-calcifying sketching horror!
Well, Rabbi Loew to the Ground, the snake in question here, did yawn at Alexis once. Â We think it was a yawn anyway. Â A menace-filled “If I wasn’t sleepy I’d snack on your entrails” yawn.
Also, you can apparently use snakes as hats. Â I. Did. Not. Know. That. Â The next time I visit my folks in the mountains of North Carolina, I’m adding that to my to-do list.
1) Eat at 12 Bones BBQ.
2) Have a beer with friends.
3) Grab that stupid snake sunning on the porch and wear it as a hat.
Oh, and forget the snake, Rio was stunning. She had some gorgeous poses, and treated us to a fantastic belly dance performance—we’ll give you a little sample of that later on in the blog, so keep reading.
A quick break later it was time for the 5-minute poses, the first of which was the opposite hand contest where if you’re right-handed you draw with your left, if you’re left-handed you draw with your right, and if you’re ambidextrous you draw with your snake.
[cough]
The two winners received mystery shots from Russell at the bar—I have no idea what they were but they looked tasty and no one fell over, so I think it was a win.
Then, it was belly-dancing time. I’m not going to post the full video of her belly-dancing here, you’ll have to go to one of her shows for that, but it was jaw-dropping. Â Here’s a sneak peak Alexis caught with the 8 mm app on her iPhone.
God, I love that app.
After Rio had a second to catch her breath, we started back up with the two ten-minute poses. The first ten-minute pose of the evening was a contest sponsored by our brand new sponsor Flying Dog Brewery! Â Yeah, they sponsored our anniversary session with Marla Meringue, but that was a one time deal then—now they’re sponsoring us for the foreseeable future! Â Hot damn! Â Not only were there specials on Flying Dog beer, but they brought a hand-bottled bottle of Raging Bitch for the winner that was bigger than my head.
Umm, well, all the winners to-date have been bigger than my head. Â The bottle was bigger than my head.
Rio may or may not have taken the bus down to Baltimore earlier in the day, so appropriately enough, the contest theme was “Snakes on a Bus”.
Meanwhile, as we all sketched merrily away, a storm was a brewin’.  Literally.  Russell and I stepped outside to discover the Nothing was bearing down the Windup Space like an out-of-control Michael Bay explosion.  Oh, and when it hit, it hit.  Smokers scattered in gibbering terror, thunder drowned out the music, and Russell plunged head-long into a play list of nothing but “Blame it on the Rain”, “Purple Rain”, and the like.  If I could have lashed a steering wheel and myself to the door stand and screamed challenging obscenities at Mother Nature, I would have.
Instead, Russell cut me off.
And then it was time for the twenty-minute poses.  The first was a random noun contest, with the noun being Pandora’s Box.  The winner received Ricky Jay’s Celebrations of Curious People from  Atomic Books, which is located at the corner of the Avenue and Falls Rd. in Hampden.  Be careful—if you like books, walking in that place is like a crack addict getting locked in the evidence room at Central Booking.
Does Central Booking even have an evidence room? Â I dunno, I haven’t been there. Â (Momma gifted me with quick feet.)
At this point the monsoon outside had subsided and everyone outside wanting a cigarette or a quarter had been washed away to better shores. Â A five-minute break for Rio (who HAD to be in pain at that point), and it was time for the last 20-minute pose of the evening.
Since it was the day before Bill Cosby’s birthday, the contest was the best incorporation of pudding pops with the winner receiving Karen Hsiao’s Rubber Duck from Baby Tattoo Books, who, besides being an amazing publisher, run the Dr. Sketchy’s in LA, which is pretty awe-inspiring. Â Apparently only ONE person was inspired by pudding pops, so they automatically won. Â APPARENTLY the rest of the crowd wasted their childhoods. Â Yeah, I said it. Â Pudding pops rocked. Â If Billy Cosby had been there, he probably would have cried. Â On his birthday.
Many, many, many, many thanks to snake-charming, belly-dancing Rio; many thanks to Rabbi Loew for not bursting through support beams and chewing up any high school principals; thanks to our sponsors Atomic Books, Flying Dog Brewery, and Baby Tattoo books; tons of thanks to Jeff and Alexis for the death-defying nature photography you see above; thanks to Russell for slinging booze and songs; thanks to our brand new Dr. Sketchy’s person Stiger for helping me and my busted-up hand with the set-up before and after and with the timer; thanks to Fred, Kerry, and, err, several other people who helped shove some of the furniture back in place at the end; and last but not least thanks to Alexis for being our host even though she has a phobia of snakes.
What’s next?
It’s our last session of the summer and it’s with burlesque performance artist, Femme 6!
That’s right folks, between some birthday/traveling shenanigans and the Windup being closed for a week in August, there will be no sessions until September! Â Dum dum duuuuuummmmmmm. Â Next session, Monday, July 25th with Femme 6 is your last chance to attend a Dr. Sketchy’s before the, umm, cold winds of September blast through Baltimore!
That’s right, this is the last one of the summer! Â Alexis and I are going narwhaling the last two weeks of August and Russell is closing Windup for the second week so he can install a merry-go-round or some such nonsense.
That means the whole miserable, sun-blistered month of August will be a drought of Dr. Sketchy’s Baltimore goodness. Â Yup, you suckers are on your own. Â Well, for a month anyway.
So who’s posing? Â Burlesque performance artist Femme 6! Â We were going to go with Femme 4 or 5, but well, you’re special, so we went with 6 who’s, like, twice as good as 5 and is rumored to have broke a bottle over the head of 4 the last time they ran into each other. Â We’ve seen Femme 6 perform multiple times in Baltimore over the years (at least one of those was Paco Fish’s Viva La Decadence)—she was actually supposed to pose last summer, but she’s only in Baltimore for a small window every year and it didn’t work out.
If you’re curious, check our her artist manifesto on her blog.
We’ll have fabulous booze and prizes from Flying Dog Brewery, Atomic Books, and Baby Tattoo Books. Â Doors will open 6, unless I forget to unlock them again, and the whole shebang will kick off at 7 o’clock!
Photo by Jeff
Photo by Alexis
Gregory Jericho
Gregory Jericho
Gregory Jericho
Dr. Sketchy's Baltimore 