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 novel that is constructed in three parts, titled The Hot and Cold Trilogy.
As a screenwriter, I’ve optioned and adapted Djuna Barnes’ iconic novel, Nightwood, for the screen, which is now in production.
As a nonfiction author, I’ve had work published by the British Film Institute, Bloomsbury Books, Reatkion Books, Columbia University Press, the Museum of Contemporary Art (Los Angeles), Koenig Books, Bookforum, Museum of Modern Art (New York), and others. I’ve published on these topics: experimental writing, melodrama, poetry, faith, silent cinema, labor history, the kimono, the 1960s, snakes, costume, film adaptation, re-enactment video art, performance space history, medieval charivari riots and subjectivity in biography.
I am the Senior Editor of the peer-reviewed Framework: The Journal of Cinema and Media, a journal that launched in 1974.
My recent 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.
WORKS in TRANSLATION
Published in Mandarin:
BOOKS:
Hat: Origins, Language, Style (China Science and Technology Press Co., Ltd. 2024)
Snake (Beijing: Tsinghua University Press, 2022)
ESSAYS:
“Fleshed Out: Approaching the First Biography of a Now Unknown Person” (Shanghai: China Film Press, 2018)
WORK IN PROGRESS
CULTURAL HISTORY I’m currently completing a cultural history of subversive stories hidden in generic entertainment that address socially forbidden issues, a book that examines the 20th century cultural suppression in America, using examples from 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 what was notably suppressed in the culture, nevertheless appeared in film and television as a silent narrative of visual imagery that exposed the true story. This device has a centuries-old heritage across Western and Eastern cultures.
NOVEL I’m completing a novel constructed in three parts, titled The Hot and Cold Trilogy.
BIOGRAPHY I’m writing the biography of the world-famous milliner, Mr. John, who died in 1994, cited in his New York Times obituary as the “Dior of millinery.”
CURATOR / PROGRAMMER
EXHIBITION CURATOR
Film costume exhibition at the Barrymore Film Center (cancelled)
Costumes from the Gene London Collection for tour (cancelled)
CONFERENCES CO-ORGANIZER
Upcoming:
WFHI Women and the Silent Screen, location TBD, 2027
WFHI Entr’Acte online, 2026
The Warburg Institute, London (proposed): Symbolic Visual Forms in the Marion Stancioff Archive - an Iconological Approach for Putting Ideas into Practice
Past:
WFHI Women and the Silent Screen
New York 2022, Brussels 2025
WFHI EntrActe
online 2023
Film Costume/ New York University
A series of conferences, under the overall title Film Costume/, held at New York University, that I founded and co-organized with New York University Chair of the Art Department and Art Professions, and author, Nancy Deihl, that focuses on all aspects of film costume design.
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 Notting Hill 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 Stewart Home and Lynn Heijinian.
PROFESSOR
An adjunct professor at New York University for almost 10 years, I’ve taught at The Pratt Institute, Bard Graduate Center, University of Stockholm and Holloway Prison (UK) among others.
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 Marion Stancioff 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.
WOMEN AND FILM HISTORY INTERNATIONAL (WFHI)
President of WFHI, 2022-2025 www.wfhi.org
A network of affiliated scholars, researchers, archivists, and film programmers dedicated to the study of women’s film history.
INTERVIEWER
I’ve interviewed many people, including Shirin Neshat, Gore Vidal, Terence Davies and Susan Meiselas as well as numerous people in the film, theater and television industries including costume designers, union representatives, performance artists and television pioneers.
INTERVIEWED IN
FILMS:
Natacha Rambova: Beyond the Shadow (Georgina Sas, Spain, 2019)
Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy Blaché (Pamela Green, US, 2019)
PUBLICATIONS/ONLINE (selected):
The New York Times; BBC RADIO 4; MEL-Men’s Magazine; Barrymore Film Center
MEMBERSHIP/UNIONS (select)
The Author's Guild, American Association of University Professors,
Press Club (France), PEN America, UAW (United Automobile Workers)
POST PRISON EDUCATION
Scholarship for formerly incarcerated women
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. 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.