![\"Kamakaze](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Kamakaze-dancing-during-the-exhibits-opening-night-1.jpeg\")
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Edgardo Encarnacion, \u201cKamakaze\u201d was part of the third generation of the New York City Breakers.<\/p>\n
Photo by Siddhartha Harmalkar.<\/p>\n
\t\t Search our comprehensive guide to things to do in the Bronx<\/a> for more local events \u2014 or submit your own<\/a>!<\/p>\n During the opening night of the Bronx County Historical Society\u2019s \u201cWhen The Bronx Moved<\/a>\u201d exhibition in February, every room of the colonial-era building was packed with dancers who grew up learning from the legends celebrated on its walls.<\/p>\n \u201cAll of these people are my family,\u201d Edgardo Encarnacion, \u201cKamakaze\u201d said, spreading his arms to encompass the crowd gathered and pointing out people who helped him break into the South Bronx dance scene in his early 20s.\u00a0<\/p>\n Kamakaze was part of the third generation of the New York City Breakers<\/a>, and got his name after jumping in to battle anyone regardless of their status in the dance community.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhen you\u2019re around family, you know who they are,\u201d he said. \u201cEven though you haven\u2019t seen them for like 20 or 30 years, you still have a historic connection with that person.\u201d<\/p>\n Kamakaze started dancing after losing his brother as a teenager. \u201cThat\u2019s what kept me alive, the dancing.\u201d\n<\/p>\n The Bronx County Historical Society<\/a>, a non-profit educational and cultural institution chartered by the New York State Board of Regents, was founded in 1955. The group is dedicated to the preservation of the history of the Bronx and lower Westchester County, from its habitation by Indigenous communities through the present.<\/p>\n \u201cThese exhibits are extremely important because they are a portal into the most significant cultural renaissance of the last 50 years,\u201d said Jorge \u201cPopmaster Fabel\u201d Pabon, who led a guided tour of the exhibit.<\/p>\n He described, with tales of what it was like to chart out a path in the dance scene while navigating life amongst the ruins of dilapidated buildings.<\/p>\n Fabel, who was born and raised in East Harlem, transformed the photos on the wall into a living experience with gripping stories of the vibrant and chaotic time period, stopping at times to break out into dance.<\/p>\n One of the dance forms celebrated by the exhibit is \u201cThe Hustle\u201d, whose path from basement parties to \u201cSaturday Night Fever\u201d was cemented at St. Mary\u2019s Recreation Center, where pioneers like Willie Estrada<\/a> worked with staff to create a rare safe haven.\u00a0<\/p>\n Fabel\u2019s stories evoked scenes from \u201cWest Side Story\u201d and \u201cSinners.\u201d New Yorkers of all backgrounds gathering to dance in fiercely competitive battles that sometimes erupted in violence, or coming together in carefully planned community events to let off steam amidst the destruction around them.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe were the phoenix that rose from the ashes,\u201d he said.\n<\/p>\n Since 1982, Fabel has been internationally recognized for his contributions to the culture, gaining world renown as a featured dancer in the hip-hop cult classic movie \u201cBeat Street.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Fabel is also known for his work as an aerosol artist and muralist in the early 1980s, and as the creator of signature styles of art on canvases and clothing.<\/p>\n \u201cI was born dancing,\u201d he said, pointing to the African and Ta\u00edno roots that make up his Puerto Rican identity. \u201cIt\u2019s instilled in the house at a young age to express yourself culturally. There\u2019s a cultural imperative. It\u2019s like eating and breathing.\u201d<\/p>\n The exhibit features rare personal photos, clothing, oral histories and video clips documenting the emergence of Hustle, Rocking, Burning, Breakin\u2019, and Boogying in the Bronx.<\/p>\n Attendees nodded along as he called out the erasure of Puerto Ricans from hip-hop history, shouting out names of Black Puerto Rican dance legends and jumping in to complement his retellings with their own stories.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cBeing given this platform here is priceless. It\u2019s priceless,\u201d Fabel said. \u201cTo be given the privilege and honor of sharing some of the past history and sprinkle in my own history basically keeps me alive.\u201d<\/p>\n One of the attendees on the exhibit\u2019s opening night was Coke La Rock, widely recognized<\/a> as hip-hop\u2019s first MC.<\/p>\n He described how hip-hop came out of people speaking over beats in recreation rooms and one-upping each other\u2019s fashion trends. They didn\u2019t have hip-hop legends to lean on and had to come up with it by themselves, he said, explaining how young people put together dancing, beats and fashion to create something new.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were the patent and everybody else was the product, and look where the product went, it went around the world,\u201d Coke La Rock said.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n London Reyes, also known as B-Boy London, is the president of the New York City Breakers and curated the Breaking portion of the exhibit.\n<\/p>\n Reyes, who grew up in the South Bronx reflected on the suffering due to the destruction of parts of the Bronx during the 1970s fires<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cHow do you respond to adversity? Because everybody goes through it. It\u2019s your response that determines your character.\u201d\n<\/p>\n To him, that\u2019s what hip-hop is \u2013 learning to deal with challenges in a way that\u2019s accessible to everyone. \u201cSome people are visual learners. Some people are audio learners. Everyone learns differently.\u201d<\/p>\n Along with the Bronx Museum of History, the Bronx County Historical Society operates a research library and the Edgar Allan Poe Cottage, a national landmark historic house museum.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of people that have wonderful stories, we just haven\u2019t heard their version or their side yet. So it\u2019d be nice to get them all to come out,\u201d Reyes said. \u201cThe point of the exhibit is for people born and raised in the Bronx to document their own culture.\u201d<\/p>\n Siddhartha Harmalkar is a freelance writer for the Bronx Times. For more coverage, subscribe to our newsletter<\/a> and follow us on Twitter<\/a>, Facebook<\/a> and Instagram<\/a>!<\/p>\n \t![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Popmaster-Fabel-explaining-how-the-fashion-styles-that-shaped-the-early-Hip-Hop-scene-came-to-be-alo.jpeg\")
Jorge \u201cPopmaster Fabel\u201d Pabon, led a guided tour of \u201cWhen The Bronx Danced.\u201d Photo by Siddhartha Harmalkar.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Screenshot-2026-03-18-at-12.30.45-PM.jpg\")
Coke La Rock standing next to a 1974 picture of himself. \u201cThey didn\u2019t call it Hip Hop when this picture was taken,\u201d he said. Courtesy of The Bronx Historical Society.<\/p>\n