Chavisa Woods is a Brooklyn based literary author. Woods recently completed her second work of fiction, “The Albino Album,” a novel, which is set to be released by Seven Stories Press in the spring of 2013. Her debut collection of short stories, “Love Does Not Make Me Gentle or Kind” (Fly By Night Press, 2009) was a Lambda Literary Award finalist for Debut Fiction. The second edition if this book is set to be released by Autonomedia Press in April of 2012.
Chavisa Woods has featured as a reader with a number of renowned institutions and festivals. She featured in a performance series, which ran for five days at The Whitney Museum in New York City, as a member of the Chorus of Poets (September). She has also been featured at the New York Vision Festival three different years. As part of the New York HOT Festival, she presented a multimedia reading of her work, “Love Does Not Make Me Gentle or Kind” at the Dixon Place Theater, 2009 and her short fiction in 2011. She has been featured in a number of L.E.S. Howl Festival events, annually since 2004. For the past three Years she has been a featured reader at St. Marks Poetry Project’s annual Poetry Turn On. She also featured twice as a reader and performer at the historic WOW women’s theater. Other notable venues include; Smalls Jazz Club, Bluestockings Bookstore, Quimby’s Bookstore, McNally Jackson and others. In January 2010, she traveled to Paris and lived in the historic writer’s room at Shakespeare and Company Bookstore.
Woods has presented lectures on short fiction and poetry at a number of universities, including: Penn State, Sarah Lawrence College, Bard College, Brooklyn Tech and the New School.
Woods’ poetry, short stories and essays have been published nationally and internationally. Her poem, “Seventeen” was published in the Evergreen Review, founded in 1957 by Barney Rosset, publisher of Grove Press. In the 2010 Stonewall Issue of Danse Macabre, two of her works were published alongside such renowned poets as Ellen Bass and Zhuang Yisa. Her literary essay, “The Scarlet Pimp(ernel)” was included in the recent collection “Worst Book I Ever Read,” Autonomedia Press, 2009. Three of her poems were included in the historic New York Issue of “Matador,” edited by Mireia Sentis, Spain, 2008. An excerpt of her essay “On David Hammons,” was featured in Sotheby’s May Catalogue, 2008. In 2006, she received publication in ‘Wildflowers’, (Woodstock New York) alongside such renowned writers as Anne Waldman and Robert Kelly. Other notable publications include: Bard Gay and Lesbian Review Worldwide, Prima Materia, Fiction Circus, and others.
She has been featured in interviews on: WBAI, Cat radio Café, 2009, Columbia Radio, 2009, and KDHX St. Louis, literature for the Halibut, 2009, as well as on the CBS Morning show, Iowa, 2006. In 2003, Chavisa Woods was featured “Rhapsodists,” a documentary on young female spoken word artists.
In 2006, Woods founded the Check Your Bit reading series in Hudson New York, where she resided for eight months. This series is still active, housed in the historic Hudson River Theater Building. From 2000, to 2002 she was active in PSI, as well as Influx Art, an organization dedicated to community involvement in art. She curate interactive art events and literary readings. She was also a member of C.A.M.P. (Community Arts and Media Project), focused on integrating sustainable living, political activism and art.
In 2009, her collection of fiction received outstanding reviews in: The Brooklyn Rail, The Short Review, The Feminist Review, Pedestal Magazine, Go Magazine, The fiction Circus, and others.
Chavisa Woods is currently completing her first full-length collection of poetry as well as her second book of fiction. She also recently participated in a month-long collaborative exhibition and performance series combining visual artists with literary authors at the Cervantes Institute, March, 2011.
