Halloween
comes but once a year. However, those with a penchant for the uncanny, the odd,
and the occult can find multiple opportunities to expel their spooky energy
throughout the year. There is, quite literally, a market for it.
The Moon, Serpent, and Bone Oddities and Curiosities Night Market, run by Beacon resident Amy Wilson, takes
place on June 21st. Now in its sixth year, the market is cloaked in the
ritualistic and spiritual aesthetic of the summer solstice, and runs from 6 PM
to midnight on the pastoral grounds of City Winery in Montgomery.
Local
artisans pioneering taxidermy sculptures, bone art, and gothic vintage display
their wares. Performers—everything from stilt-walkers to snake charmers—roam
the grounds. Together, the market is a celebration of the macabre, put on by
those whose church is a gothic one, and might just share some witch DNA.
“I
call [this community] fringe folk,” says Wilson, who runs Moon, Serpent, and Bone. “[We are] people who skate on the
outskirts of normal society. We just have alternative ways of being.” To the
uninitiated, Wilson describes the night market as “Party City and Spirit
Halloween on steroids.” But more than streamers and costumes that are brought
out once a year, the night market captures the allure of the spirit realmwith a committed artfulness. Think
cursed carnival, hexes, tarot, and circus (the haunted kind).
Unlike
the City Wineries in Boston and New York City, Montgomery’s branch of the
national brand has plenty of outdoor space, making use of the lush green
landscape that runs astride the Wallkill River. The building, a beautifully
restored factory, has dining areas, a large main stage, and multiple bars.
Combining wine and cultural experience, the venue is running a specialty wine
just for the night market.
Filling
the grounds of the venue will be over 60 vendors and psychic readers. Check out
Blue Santa Cult, who create otherworldly dolls and puppets
out of sculpted animal heads, nightmarish yet strangely beautiful. Visit The Dentist Office, who sell all kinds of bones, ominous
spiritual icons, and other grisly wares. Vagabond Spun will be there too with their gorgeous
handcrafted brooms. Get a psychic reading with Nicole Nightfall, a Hudson Valley-based psychic, witch, and
paranormal specialist, whose speciality is
communicating with the departed.
The
headliner of the evening will be Diiiotima Arts, a traveling performance troupe that deploys
acrobatics, circus arts, magic, tying it together with gripping showmanship and
audience interaction. In the style of a wayward nomadic carnival, but way
sexier, the troupe boasts aerialists, sword-swallowers, and fire-breathers
performing with a daredevil flare and tantalizingly ghoulish spirit.
The
first Oddities and Curiosities night market took place in March of 2019. “It’d
be nice if I could get 100 people [to show up]” Wilson remembers thinking at
the time. On the day, over 700 people attended, solidifying the idea for Wilson
that an odd-and-curious-shaped gap in the market existed. Since then, Wilson
has hosted multiple markets every year, falling on traditional witch sabbath. There’s one on Ostara, a pagan holiday celebrating
the spring equinox, a yule market (favoring Krampus over Santa), and of course
a Halloween market, which Wilson calls by its traditional Gaelic name Samhain,
the busiest time of year.
Not
the kind of market where you buy a trinket and leave, these markets are like
stepping into another world where ghouls, witches, and spirits reign supreme.
“I want it to be an immersive experience where you feel like you are in another
realm.” Says Wilson.
The
Moon, Serpent, and Bone Oddities and Curiosities Night Market takes place on
June 21 from 6 PM to midnight on June 2 at City Winery, Montgomery. Get tickets here.
