Bushwick Artist Planning Bernie Sanders Campaign Party in His Live/Work Loft

In the escalating face-off between Democratic primary candidates Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders to prove who is more Brooklyn, we have a clear frontrunner today.

That’s because Sanders’ supporters in Brooklyn are throwing him a campaign party on Wednesday — in a third-floor, 1,000-square-foot live/work loft space in Bushwick.

Party host Steve Panovich — better known as Steve Five, frontman for local band The Library Is on Fire — has been using the loft as an art studio and concert venue since he moved in almost a decade ago.

“It’s always just been rock shows with local bands and out-of-town bands that I’m friends with,” he says. “But I’ve been following Bernie for a couple years now, and when I heard he was running, I was like, ”I gotta do something.”

Panovich will be squeezing more than 80 Sanders supporters into his loft at 114 Forrest Street on Wednesday night. Current status is “standing room only.”

“Recently I decided to make a late-night monster movie television show, like the ones back in the ‘70s. So the loft right now is decorated like an old dungeon,” he says. “People are probably going to show up and be like, ’What’s going on here?’”

Preview below.

Sanders himself won’t be in attendance, as he’s on the campaign trail right now. However, he will be live-streaming into the loft party for around 20 minutes to talk business with his Brooklyn foot soldiers.

Panovich was also planning to set up a DIY screen-printing station at the party for churning out Sanders T-shirts and such, but now he’s just doing the printing himself. (Because the loft will probably be too crowded for on-site arts and crafts.)

He says Clinton’s choice of a secretive Brooklyn Heights skyscraper for her campaign headquarters is “kind of a telling difference from my Bushwick loft.”

Shots fired.

HT DNAinfo. Photos courtesy of Steve Panovich.