Marcel Duchamp was a French (later American) artist, writer, sculptor, best known for his works Nude Descending a Staircase, Fountain, The Large Glass, his contributions to Cubism, Dada, and Surrealism, and his influence on later artists and writers, associated with Conceptual Art, among others. He was also a passionate chess-player, and regarded chess a form of art. In addition to The Blind Man, he edited New York Dada with Man Ray in 1921, and in the 40s, co-edited the surrealist VVV, with David Hare, André Breton, and Max Ernst, and became involved with another surrealist magazine View. He sometimes appeared in drag under his pseudonym ‘Rrose Sélavy’. For a while he collaborated with Katherine Dreier, and Man Ray, on Société Anonyme, Inc., an experimental and pedagogical ‘museum of modern art.’ He has a cameo in René Clair’s short film Entr’acte (1924). In 1962, he joined Oulipo, as an American correspondent.

Beatrice Wood was an American artist, writer, and ceramicist. Before editing The Blind Man, she studied painting, acting, and dance in France, where she met the likes of Sarah Bernhardt and Isadora Duncan. Back in New York, her work was exhibited in the exhibition of the Society of Independent Artists in 1917. She eventually moved to Ojai, California, to live close to the philosopher J. Krishnamurthi, and taught ceramics at his Happy Valley School. She was often referred to as ‘Mama of Dada’, which is also the title of a film about her life. At age 90, she started writing, encouraged by her friend, the French writer Anais Nin. In her best-known work, her autobiography I Shock Myself, she recalls, among other things, her involvement with New York Dada and modernism; the memoir and Wood’s life also inspired the character ‘Rose’ in James Cameron’s film Titanic.

Henri-Pierre Roché was a French writer, journalist, art collector and dealer. He was the author of the novels Jules et Jim and Deux anglaises et le continent, later turned into films by François Truffaut. He corresponded or was acquainted with many avant-garde artists and writers of his time, such as Georges Braque, Blaise Cendrars, Jean Cocteau, Le Corbusier, Isadora Duncan, Ford Madox Ford, James Joyce, Paul Klee, Pablo Picasso, Diego Rivera, Ezra Pound, Erik Satie, Gertrude Stein, and John Quinn.

Sophie Seita is an interdisciplinary artist, writer, and researcher. Her text- and research-based practice spans poetry, performance, lecture-performance, video, translation, and multimedia collaborations. Her work has recently been presented at Art Night 2018 (Oxo Tower, London), SAAS-Fee Summer Institute of Art, the Royal Academy, Bold Tendencies, the Arnolfini, La MaMa Galleria, Cité Internationale des Arts, Parasol Unit, Company Gallery, and elsewhere. She’s the author of the poetry and performance books Meat (Little Red Leaves), Fantasias in Counting (BlazeVOX), and 12 Steps (Wide Range); the translator of Uljana Wolf’s Subsisters: Selected Poems (Belladonna*); and the editor of a centenary reprint of The Blind Man (Ugly Duckling Presse), named one of the Best Art Books of 2017 by The New York Times. She is also currently a Research Fellow at Queens’ College, University of Cambridge, where she recently finished her monograph Provisional Avant-Gardes: Little Magazine Communities from Dada to Digital, forthcoming from Stanford University Press in 2019.

Elizabeth Zuba is a poet and translator. Her recent translations include Marcel Broodthaers’s Pense-Bête (Granary Books), 10,000 Francs Reward (Printed Matter), While reading the Lorelei (for exhibition MoMA 2016) and Marcel Broodthaers: My Ogre Book Shadow Theater Midnight (Siglio Press) with Maria Gilissen; Nicolás Paris’s Leaves a Trace for The Valise (Library Council of the MoMA); Anouck Durand’s Eternal Friendship (Siglio Press, 2017 French Voices Award); Arnaldo Calveyra’s Letters So That Happiness (Ugly Duckling Presse); and the writings of Erik Satie, Francis Picabia and other contributors to Dada magazine The Blind Man (Ugly Duckling Presse).