Bio
Jennifer Shahade is a Philadelphia based writer and gamesplayer. She is a two-time American Women’s Chess Champion (2002, 2004). Her first book, Chess Bitch: Women in the Ultimate Intellectual Sport intertwined her own story with that of great women chess champions past and present. Jennifer is forever in search of new ways to present games. 2009 was a particularly fruitful year for this: She created hula-chess and naked chess with DimMak Films and roulette-chess with artist and curator Larry List. Jennifer is currently in post production for two 2010 video projects, a feminist poker fairy tale and a reality chess TV show.
Shahade chaired the 2009-2010 US Championships, held at the Chess Club and Scholastic Center of Saint Louis. She also does play by play commentary and hosted video recaps during the US Chess Championships and the US Women’s.
Jennifer is a semi-professional poker player, and placed 17th out of more than 1200 players in the 2007 Ladies World Series of Poker event. She followed this up with placing 33rd out of 1190 in the same event in 2008.
Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, New In Chess, the L.A. Times, Games Magazine and Chess Life Magazine, for which Jennifer is the web-editor. Shahade also contributed to Marcel Duchamp: The Art of Chess, which you can purchase here. In conjunction with DimMak Films Shahade created a video, nakedchess, and a video installation, hulachess, both inspired by the book project.
In 2007, Jennifer Shahade and Jean Hoffman founded 9queens, a non-profit that provides chess instruction to those most in need of its benefits, especially girls and at-risk youth. Throughout her career, Jennifer has made a point of focusing her coaching efforts on girls and the inner-city, starting with her five-years of coaching work with Chess-In-The-Schools in New York. Her work with CIS included starting a Girls’ Academy and three years of training with the Championship Junior High School team, I.S. 318.
Jennifer performs simultaneous exhibitions in which she plays up to 50 people at once, in locations as various as Shanghai, China, Soweto, South Africa and a Girls’ Scout Convention in Los Angeles. Jennifer has also participated in and helped organize events at art galleries and museums, including the Noguchi Museum in Queens, the Saint Louis University Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of Art, the Viewing Room Gallery in New York, The Philadelphia Fringe Festival and the Psycho-Geography Festival.
You can reach Jennifer at jenshahade@gmail.com.
