2012 Conference Co-Chairs

Contact these folks via email at: info [at] femme2012 [dot] com

jen valles has been a member of the Femme Conference Steering Committee since 2007, serving as Accessibility and Awareness Chair for the 2008 and 2010 conferences. A queer mixed-race Femme, jen has lived many lives: gardener, performer, activist, educator, creator, bread baker, soup maker. her paid and unpaid work has focused largely on queer liberation, gender-based violence, and the sex trade – she currently manages an anti-violence program on Chicago’s Southwest side. her likes include dismantling privilege & oppression, the lost truths of both/and, and locating the community and power in the space in-between. she also enjoys soft and stinky cheese, whiskey and dancing, although not necessarily altogether or in that order.

Krista Smith aka Kentucky Fried Woman is an Oakland, CA based social justice activist and queer femme tap-dancing performance artist and cabaret performer/emcee/producer. She co-founded and performs with several groups including ButchTap & Titland. She also collaborates with many bay area queer performance artists. KFW is known for her wacky events like the always themed Kentucky Fried Woman Show. KFW started performing in the queer drag/burlesque community with the Santa Barbara based troupe the Disposable Boy Toys in 2000 and went on to found the Seattle-based ground-breaking, fat postive, queer performance group the Queen Bees before relocating to Oakland. She is available to produce, perform and emcee events and also teaches classes and facilitates workshops on a variety of subjects related to bodies and identity.  She is featured in Femmes of Power, Queering the Popular Pitch & Love Letter. When not on the stage or busy plotting revolutionary actions, Krista can be found in her kitchen happily making Southern Living recipes come to life or watching Oscar winning movies.  She has been a member of the FemmeCollective and Femme Conference Steering Committee since 2005 and is thrilled to be co-chairing this year’s conference.  You can learn more about what she is up to on and off the stage at: https://www.facebook.com/KyFriedWoman.   Photo by Jen Gilomen