Benavides, Baltrónica-Gomez, Dunitz-Johnson, + Cyd Nova

Denise Benavides
Denise Benavides is an oakland based queer xicana poet and performer. you can find her latest publication through Third Woman Press: a zine titled writing through bipolar in sixteen steps. She holds an MFA in creative writing and is currently working on her upcoming collection of poetry, riot girl.

Jess Baltrónica-Gomez
Balitronica is a performance artist, cyborg poet, and queer sex radical raised on the Tijuana/San Diego border. She studied Literature at San Diego State University under the guidance of Harold Jaffe, Edith Frampton, and Sydney Brown. She then relocated to Paris to study American Expat Literature and lived in a 17th century convent with Dominican nuns. Currently living in San Francisco, she recently earned her MFA in Poetry and Queer Theory at Mills College. Since 2013 she has been collaborating with Guillermo Gomez-Pena and La Pocha Nostra and has developed photo-performance projects with Manuel Vason, Herani Hache, RJ Muna, and Marcos Raya. She is currently working on a book titled, “A Brief Conversation With My Psychotherapist” and touring as a member of the International performance art troupe La Pocha Nostra.

Cyd Nova
Cyd Nova is a mouthy slut and celebrator of all hos’. He has been part of the St James Infirmary family, a clinic for folks who have been involved in the sex trade in San Francisco, for 8 years and this month is leaving to return back to his roots of hustling and writing gossipy zines. He is the co-director of Bonus Hole Boys – the first gay hardcore website featuring FTM men. His writing has appeared on the Rumpus, Policy Mic, Tits and Sass, Visual AIDS and in the books Coming Out Like a Porn Star and The Collection: The New Transgender Vanguard. Currently he is working on a series of comics based on the more comically intense moments of life. You can check out his writing at cydnova.wordpress.com

Ariel Dunitz-Johnson
Ariel is a San Francisco based illustrator who trained at Parsons School of Design in New York City. Her illustrations focus primarily on pen and ink work, specializing in portraiture. She was recently awarded San Francisco Beautiful’s Muni Art Winner with her portrait project, SWAY: Contemporary Queer Portraiture. Through Muni Art, her work was shown on buses around San Francisco during the fall/winter of 2015. Ariel has been freelancing for nearly a decade, having shows of her personal work whenever she can. She finds inspiration everywhere, from the architectural lines of the urban landscape, the many faces in everyday life, to sticks, stones and other natural objects that she collects. When she’s not busy drawing, she’s usually shopping at farmer’s markets, cooking for her partner, or playing with her Boston Terriers, Harley and Levi.