Author Description

Sara Penn's Knobkerry: An Oral History Sourcebook is the culmination a years-long oral history project, conceived and developed by writer and oral historian Svetlana Kitto, that begins to demarcate a potential sphere of influence for artist and designer Sara Penn (1927-2020) and Knobkerry, the store she founded and ran in New York City. This publication assembles fifteen long-form interviews with figures close to Penn and Knobkerry, conducted by Kitto between 2017 and 2020, including Sara Penn, Andrea Aranow, Charles Daniel Dawson, David Hammons, Joanne Robinson Hill, Kate Prendergast and Jane Barrell Yadav, Sana Musasama, Eric Robertson, Fumi Schmidt, Seret Scott, Elena Solow, Carol Thompson, Ken Tisa, and Paulette Young. It also includes extensive reproductions of archival materials related to Penn and the store, collected by Kitto in collaboration with Penn and a number of her close relations.