BIO
I’ve lived in London, Paris, La Paz (Bolivia), Vancouver (Canada), Washington DC, San Francisco and New York,
as well as other parts of the U.S. I was brought up in the Foreign Service.
AUTHOR/EDITOR
My degree work focused on groundbreaking poets. My Ph.D., with distinction from the University of Sussex, UK,
was on the historicism of Susan Howe. My M.A., from the University of London, UK, was on time in T.S. Eliot.
My B.A., Honors thesis, from Bard College, was on the poetics of Charles Olson. At Bard, I majored in Literature and minored in Linguistics and Film.
I’m interested in writing that experiments with ways to write and that shows how writing structures our culture.
My fiction and non-fiction focus on hidden aspects of lived life and history that, though seeming suppressed,
are hidden in plain sight. As a novelist, I write what is termed experimental fiction or literary fiction and I’m currently
completing a Trilogy of novels. As a screenwriter, I’ve optioned and adapted Djuna Barnes’ iconic novel, Nightwood,
for the screen, which is now under consideration. As a nonfiction author, I’ve had work published by the British Film
Institute, Bloomsbury Books, the Museum of Contemporary Art (Los Angeles), Koenig Books and Bookforum,
among others, on experimental writing, melodrama, poetry, faith, silent cinema, labor history, the kimono, the 1960s,
snakes, costume, film adaptation and subjectivity in biography. I am the editor of the peer-reviewed Framework:
The Journal of Cinema and Media, a journal that was started in 1974. My latest book, Hat: Origins, Language, Style
(Reaktion Books, 2019), studies the hat as a vital part of every society (from symbols to style), a role that began in
the Ice Age and is still current today.
WORK IN PROGRESS
I’m now writing Transfigure, a book that examines the 20th century cultural suppression of the reality of violence
in America. Using three examples - the silent film era costume designs of Clare West, the 1940s figure of the
Film Noir femme fatale, and the 1960s television series Perry Mason - the book argues that this suppression,
nevertheless, appeared in film and television as a silent narrative of visual imagery that exposed the true story.
CURATOR / PROGRAMMER
EXHIBITION CURATOR / DESIGNER
Film Costume at the Center of the World
Film costume exhibit: for the opening of the Barrymore Film Center, October 2021
to run October 2021 - January 2022
Costumes from the Gene London Collection
CONFERENCE ORGANIZER
In 2022, I’m organizing the conference Theda Bara and Her Legacy for the Barrymore Film Center, in Fort Lee,
New Jersey, looking at the 1910s superstar Theda Bara, from her career at Fox Studio in Fort Lee, where American
cinema began before it moved to Hollywood, to her influence today.
CONFERENCE CO-ORGANIZER
Women in the Silent Screen 2022
As the Future President of the Women’s Film History International (WFHI), I’m involved in WFHI’s biennial conference,
Women in the Silent Screen, to be held at Columbia University, New York, and the BFC, Fort Lee, in June 2022.
Film Costume/
A series of annual conferences, under the overall title, Film Costume/, held at New York University, that I founded and then co-organized with New York University Head of Costume Studies and author, Nancy Deihl, that focuses on all aspects of film costume design. New York’s Museum of the Moving Image may be the next host, in 2022.
PROGRAMMING FILM SCREENING / PANELS
I’ve programmed film screenings and/or panels at New York’s Museum of Modern Art, Film at Lincoln Center,
the Tribeca Film Festival, Anthology Film Archives and the Whitney Museum (among others). Some were
co-programmed through my then role as the co-chair of the Women’s Film Preservation Fund, a subdivision
of New York Women in Film and Television.
READING / PERFORMANCE SERIES
In London, I founded, and then co-curated with artist Thomas Evans, the East West Series, held in Nottinghill
at the Gate Theater and the East West Gallery, featuring writers, musicians, poets, publishers, scholars and filmmakers, including Rebecca Solnit, John Ashbery, Fanny Howe, Charles Bernstein, Barry Guy, Henri Chopin
and Lynn Heijinian
PROFESSOR
I’m an adjunct professor at New York University and, at times, the Pratt Institute. I’ve taught courses in global literature, experimental literature, poetry, cinema studies, literature/film studies, production design, costume studies, critical theory
and creative writing (fiction, poetry, and non-fiction) in London and New York, having lived in both cities for many years, working in university, prison and community college venues.
RESEARCHER
As a researcher I’ve worked for clients on topics ranging from cults to 1930s revues. One of the longest
and most interesting was in London, working as researcher and illustrator for The Stancioff Symbols Archive,
a massive global collection, in five languages, collected by Marion Stancioff that covers visual symbols
from the Paleolithic to the present. It is now housed at The Warburg Institute. Other clients have included
screenwriter Troy Kennedy-Martin, producer Dyson Lovell, and documentarian Cinda Firestone.
INTERVIEWER
I’ve interviewed many people, including Gore Vidal, Susan Meiselas, and Shirin Neshat, as well as numerous people
in the film, theater and television industries including costume designers, union representatives, performance artists
and television pioneers.
INTERVIEWED IN
Natacha Rambova: Beyond the Shadow (Georgina Sas, Spain, 2019)
Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy Blaché (Pamela Green, US, 2019)
POST PRISON EDUCATION
Women Go to College Scholarship
Having taught Creative Writing in prison and been on the PEN Prison Writing Committee for many years,
I’m building a college scholarship fund for formerly incarcerated women, with the working title of Women Go to College.
This will fund college tuition, provide accompanying funding for therapy and include a set of short introductory group
discussions about the college experience – from eating to essays.
LINK TO FULL CV