Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
The Schmooze

Arts Festival Reinvents Brighton Beach

Babushki chattering in Russian, store awnings adorned in Cyrillic, the scent of fresh pierogi in the air — for decades, these displaced attributes of Soviet culture have been characteristic of Brighton Beach, New York’s Russian-speaking enclave in the southern tip of Brooklyn. While much of the borough was busy gentrifying, Brighton managed to stay frozen in time — to the chagrin of many New York Russians, who prefer not to be associated with the ethnic stereotypes of “Little Odessa.” To challenge these negative associations, ArtOnBrighton — a music and arts festival celebrating the diversity of modern post-Soviet Jewry — will take place September 8 just a short walk from the storied neighborhood.

ArtOnBrighton will be held at the New York Aquarium and adjacent beach, and will feature visual art and performances by some of the community’s artists, musicians and entertainers, as well as a beach dance party in the evening with fire spinners and a beachside art installation.

“In today’s Russian-Jewish community, Brighton Beach has become more of a blemish than an icon of our existence, because we’ve moved on from who we were 25 years ago,” said Lisa Grebenyuk, program director at the Council of Jewish Émigré Community Organizations (COJECO) and a post-Soviet Jew.

“We’re now multi-cultural, metropolitan, living all over New York City and certainly not just on Brighton Beach. And so the idea was to take back Brighton and embrace it, rather than turning away and pretending it wasn’t part of who we are.”

Featured among the impressive lineup of talent are comedian Kira Soltanovich, “gypsy steampunk” Emperor Norton’s Stationary Marching Band, award-winning sideshow performer Lady Aye, and Brooklyn-based African-American Jewish hip-hop artist Y-Love, who stirred up media buzz and controversy in the Jewish community this past spring when he came out publicly as gay.

“Y-Love may not seem like a natural go-to as a headliner for a post-Soviet Jewish festival, but he approaches Judaism with a curiosity that is similar to our generation’s,” said organizer Margarita Korol, an “urban pop artist.” Like the young generation of post-Soviet Jewish youth growing up in New York today, Y-Love embraces elements of Judaism in somewhat unconventional ways — which is his appeal.

Y-Love won’t be the only one mixing flavors at the festival. Contradiction seems to be something of a theme, with bands mixing klezmer and punk rock, or hiphop with soul. The artists do not hesitate to juxtapose sounds and imagery in the spirit of the ever-evolving culture they are honoring.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.