This week’s HOWL! festival offers a feast of East Village counterculture. For those wanting a little more “counter,” there’s the free Squatter Fest at St. Mark’s Church this Friday and Saturday. Friday night, Aug. 26, at 9 p.m., will see Jerry “Jerry the Peddler” Wade play his collection of classic 1950s and ’60s rock concert videos, with sound, by the likes of Wilson Pickett and James Brown, in between performances by D.J.’s Nigel and Gringo Loco. St. Mark’s on Friday night will also be the venue of the Critical Mass after-party marking the one-year-anniversary of the police crackdown on the monthly bike ride, which first started seeing mass arrests during the Critical Mass before last year’s Republican National Convention.
Saturday, Aug. 27, starting at 2 p.m., St. Mark’s, at 10th St. and Second Ave., will see spoken-word and electronic performances by Peter Missing, artwork on display by “World War III” and Fly and a slideshow by graphic novel artist Seth Tobocman, a performance by D.J. Arrow Chrome and, from 8 p.m. to midnight, a Graffiti and Hip-Hop Expo inside the church, with D.J. Crosby and Charlie Ahearn, producer of “Wild Style.”
Classic squatter videos will be shown continuously during the Squatter Fest on a screen in the church graveyard, including the “Battle of 319 Eighth St.,” as well as videos of the Tompkins Square Park riots.
“I think it’ll be pretty hip,” said organizer Frank Morales. “I just set up the basics and it has a sort of happeningness — and I just try to keep it under control.”
