Penny Arcade is an internationally respected performance artist, writer, political activist, and poet. One of the handful of artists who created contemporary text-based performance art beginning in the 1980s, she has continued to define the art form for nearly three decades. In 2010, Semiotext(e) published Bad Reputation, a book on her performance work that included three performance scripts. Since 1999, she has co-directed The Lower East Side Biography Project, an oral history and video project that celebrates the great spirit of cultural rebellion that has long defined downtown New York.