Frances Jaffer Book Award | Contact
Ramsay Breslin a poet, art writer, academic editor, and small press publisher. She holds a degree in English from UC Berkeley, an MFA in Writing and an MA in Visual Criticism from California College of the Arts. A former student of painting at the San Francisco Art Institute, her self-portrait was featured on the cover of Women's Studies; An Interdisciplinary Journal. Her published writing includes catalogue essays and introductions to artist's books, including Squeak Carnwath: Lists, Observations, and Counting (Chronicle Books). Her art and book reviews have appeared in the Threepenny Review, the San Francisco Chronicle, and the East Bay Express. Most recently, her poetry appears in Slurve and her essay, “The Psychology of Mourning in the Sculpture of Stephen De Staebler,” in the Spring 2010 issue of fort da. She is currently writing an experimental biography of the sculptor Stephen De Staebler.
Patricia
Dienstfrey's publications include The Woman Without
Experiences (Kelsey Street, 1995),
winner of the America Award for Fiction; Love
and Illustration (a+bend press, 2000); and
The Grand Permission: New Writings on Poetics
and Motherhood (Wesleyan, 2003), which she
co-edited with Brenda Hillman. Her work has appeared in a
number of anthologies including Moving
Borders: Three Decades of Innovative Writing by
Women, edited by Mary Margaret Sloan
(Talisman House, 1997) and The Addison Street
Anthology: Berkeley's Poetry Walk,
edited by Robert Hass and Jessica Fisher (Heyday Books,
2004). A co-founder of Kelsey Street Press, she lives with
her husband, Ted, in Berkeley, California.
Tiff Dressen lives and
roams in the region where Berkeley and Oakland meet.
She is the author of a chapbook
Keeper (from Woodland
Editions) and two chapbooks books of poetry
As Deer in Aurora Borealis and
Fugue: for Alan Turing (from
Jaybird McQueen's, stealthy elf press). Some
of her poems, reviews & essays have appeared
or are forthcoming in 26,
Five Fingers Review,
Xanthippe, New American Writing &
Outside Voices Anthology. She is an
infrequent curator of the Canessa Park Poetry Series, travels to
the Cyclades as often as possible & is
currently engaged in a poetry/painting collaboration
with San Francisco artist, Léonie Guyer. During the
day Tiff works for a physical chemist in UC Berkeley's Institute for
Quantitative Biosciences. She was born the year Kelsey Street Press was
founded.
Monica Peck is a writer and visual artist. A 2011 San Francisco Arts Commission Individual Artist Grant recipient, Peck’s work has appeared in Poetic Labor Project, EOAGH, Five Fingers, Pressed Wafer, First Intensity, The Walrus, Fact-Simile, and With+Stand; chapbooks Flesh of Fire, Bug, While You Were Watching, and Bower to Bower; galleries The Tornado, Bocana, and Krowswork. Peck co-curates readings at Canessa Park Gallery, is a member of g.e. collective, and edits Ragtag Magazine and Queer City. Peck lives in San Francisco.
Rena Rosenwasser was born and raised in New York City. After graduating Sarah Lawrence College in 1971 she moved to Berkeley, California and later obtained an MA from Mills College. In 1974 she co-founded Kelsey Street Press, where in the mid-eighties she initiated a series of collaborations between writers and artists. Rosenwasser served as Director of the Press for over twenty years. She continues to serve in an advisory position as the Press looks to its 40th anniversary, establishing Kelsey Street as one of the longest lived independent publishers of literature by women.
Rosenwasser’s poetry publications include Elevators (Kelsey Street Press, 2011);
Dittany (Taking flight) (Mayacamas Press, 1993); Unplace.Place (Leave Books, 1992); and three collaborations with artist Kate Delos: Isle (Kelsey Street Press, 1992); Aviary (Limestone Press,1988); and Simulacra (Kelsey Street Press, 1986). Her first volume of poetry, Desert Flats, was published by Kelsey Street Press in 1979. Currently a board member of Small Press Distribution, Rosenwasser has also served on the Literary Panel for the California Arts Council. She and her spouse Penny Cooper reside in Berkeley, California.
Hazel White grew up on
farms in the southwest of England and
has written about landscape in newspaper columns, national
and international magazines, and many books. She holds undergraduate
degrees in philosophy and literature, and a masters degree
in writing from California College of the
Arts. In 2008, she was one of the winners (11:50 into the
recording) of Tony Labat's I Want You . . . monolog
competition at San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
Hazel's first book, Peril as Architectural Enrichment, was published by Kelsey Street Press in 2011. Poems from it were previously published in Verse, The Denver Quarterly,
Blink, and
Tarpaulin Sky. She lives
in San Francisco.
A native St. Louisan, Valerie Witte received her MFA in Writing from the University of San Francisco. Her work has appeared in Eleven Eleven, Faultline, and Switchback, and can also be found in The Lone Mountain Anthology, published by Achiote Press. She is currently a part of the g.e. collective in San Francisco, and during her daytime hours, she edits computer books and videos in Berkeley. When she feels the urge, she hosts literary/art salons at her house in Cole Valley. Read more of her work at valeriewitte.squarespace.com.