Jeffrey Cyphers Wright

Jeffrey Cyphers Wright is a poet.

Life and Work

Wright is a poet, publisher, critic, collage artist and eco-activist involved in the community gardens of New York City.

Upon arriving in New York in 1976, Wright studied with Ted Berrigan and Alice Notley at St. Mark’s Church. He also studied with Allen Ginsberg at Brooklyn College and received an MFA in poetry. In the late 1970s he performed at PS122's avant-garde-arama. He started Hard Press in 1978 where he published three books, including the anthology 3-Zero, Turning Thirty, and 100 postcards by different artists and poets. A selection of the postcards were included in the book , and were displayed at New York Public Library. Wright read often at St. Mark's Poetry Project between 1979 and 1990 and served a three-year term on the Project Board of Directors. In 1996, Wright performed in two of the Museum of Modern Art's poetry series curated by Lita Hornick.

From 1986 until 2001 Wright published 80 issues of Cover Magazine, The Underground National, with the help of estimable artist and writer contributors including Timothy Greenfield-Sanders, Steve Mumford, Sue Scott, Judd Tully, and John Yau. The magazine covered a broad range of arts and culture, profiling many important artists in advance of their heyday. For example, Wright and Cover editors followed Steve Buscemi, Chakaia Booker, Andrea Zittel, Dawoud Bey, Sarah McLaughlin,The Cranberries, and Stux artists Andres Serrano, Vic Muniz...
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