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Aarians' comedy and creative work draw on her experiences as an African American growing up in New York.  After losing her mother, an Olympic Track and Field athlete, to a tragic car accident, her maternal Grandmother raised her from 15 months old.  While her father, "Bubsy,"  was very active and a positive influence in her life, she also witnessed him and many of her uncles suffer from the effects of drug and alcohol addiction. "My experiences as a child with no mother informed my work as an artist and helped me find peace in the hidden complexities of human behavior as a therapist."

 

Aarian Punter is a member of SAG-AFTRA whose formal name was widely known as Aarian Pope. She has performed on various stages, such as Apollo theater, Catch a Rising Star, Caroline's Comedy Club, Boston Comedy, and New York Comedy Clubs, and has appeared on screen as a background actor in several popular award-winning network shows.  Aarian wrote and performed original poems as interludes on significant recordings with the Lost Boyz, R&B duo Koffee Brown and Grammy award-winning vocal artist Anthony Hamilton. She worked as a performance poet and actor in a comedy sketch team, Secret Society, with famed comedians such as Mike Epps and Donnell Rawlings. Aarian performed her poetry through the NACA (National Association of College Activities), performing at over 25 Colleges and Universities in the United States.

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Several of Aarians’ collection of poems have been published in various poetry anthologies, including Random Houses’ “Bum Rush the Page; a Def Poetry Jam” forwarded by world-renowned poet Sonia Sanchez and Old Flame New Fire, an anthology forward by the Father of the Black Arts movement Amiri Baraka that is now archived at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem, NY. Aarian is returning to the stage as a Stand-Up Comedian as she moves toward her production affectionately called "Crust and Suger," a moving dialogue of comedic poems set in a modern world, giving voice to creatives looking to heal others through the spoken word.

 

Aarian Punter is a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Incorporated, and a wife, living in Harlem with her husband and two children.