Rosalind Pace was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1939. She is the daughter of Dr. Charles Robert Pace (1912–2011), a prominent scholar who was Professor of Educational Psychology at Syracuse University and UCLA (University of California Los Angels. She graduated from Pembroke College, the women's college in Brown University, in 1961. That same afternoon, she married Robert Paul Pearson (Brown University, class of 1960) in the chapel of the First Unitarian Church in Providence, Rhode Island.
Pace and her husband joined the United States Peace Corps and served as English teachers in Afghanistan from 1962 to 1964. Their decision to volunteer was shaped by their opposition to the Vietnam War. They served in the first group of Peace Corps volunteers invited to Afghanistan. The experience of cross-cultural teaching informed her later work as a poet, collage artist, and educator.
Pace is an award-winning poet and visual artist who has embraced both creative disciplines throughout her life. While best recognized in literary circles for her poetry, she has simultaneously nurtured a sustained passion for visual art, particularly collage.
Her poems have appeared in literary journals including the American Poetry Review (APR), Atlanta Review, Ontario Review and Denver Quarterly. She received an Artist Fellowship in Poetry from the Massachusetts Cultural Council in 2016. Pace built her career as a poet-in-the schools, working with students from kindergarten through 12th grade.
As a visual artist, Pace's works in collage spans more than five decades and was the subject of a major solo exhibition, "Rosalind Pace: Poiesis, Five Decades of Collage," at the Provincetown Art Association and Museum (PAAM) in 2024, with a concurrent exhibition at the Berta Walker Gallery in Provincetown.
Pace is deeply embedded in the Provincetown arts community. She served as director of the renowned Long Point Gallery in Provincetown. She taught poetry and art workshops at the Castle Hill Center for the Arts in Truro and at PAAM. Approximately forty years ago, Pace co-created the "Image-Making: Discover Your Voice and Vision—Create a Book" workshop with Marcia Solomon Simon (Brown University class of 1961) and taught it annually every summer first at Castle Hill and then at PAAM. The workshop explores book design, poem making, letter design, mono-printing, and collage through parallel visual and verbal activities, guiding participants to create a handmade book.
This collection consists of the personal and professional papers of Rosalind Pace, Brown University Class of 1961. This collection documents Pace's dual career as a poet and visual artist, her Peace Corps volunteer service teaching English in Afghanistan from 1962 to 1964, and her decades of teaching in the Provincetown and Truro arts communities. Materials include correspondence, handwritten notes, writing drafts, and teaching materials. The collection spans from 1960 to 2025 and is arranged into 7 series.
Series 1, CAREER, 1964 – 2024, includes correspondence, event materials, clippings, and photographs of Pace. Of particular interest are her artist statements. Original folder titles are written in quotations, all other folder titles processor created. This series is arranged alphabetically by record type.
Series 2, UNITED STATES PEACE CORPS VOLUNTEER SERVICE, 1962 – 1969, includes correspondence written to family and friends, notebooks, and the training manual and drafts of a manual co-written by Pace. Of particular interest are her passport, Afghan visa form, and a manual which Pace supervised and helped create, the Cross-Cultural Training in Libya, which were edited by Louis Dupree. This series is arranged alphabetically by record type.
Series 3, CORRESPONDENCE, 1974-2017, contains personal and professional correspondence from various senders including Philip Levine, W.S. Merwin, Stephen Dunn, and John Hawkes. Topics include writing and research. Correspondence also appears throughout the collection as it directly relates to specific series. This series is arranged alphabetically by provenance – by sender, recipient, or subject.
Series 4, TEACHING AND WORKSHOPS, 1982– 2025, includes correspondence, handwritten notes, annotated readings, and handouts related to the development and teaching of various workshops. Of particular interest are materials related to the "Image-Making: Discover Your Voice and Vision—Create a Book" workshop co-created by Pace and Marcia Solomon Simon (Brown University class of 1961). Original folder titles are written in quotations, all other folder titles processor created. This series is arranged alphabetically by workshop title.
Series 5, WRITINGS, 1960 – 2025, includes annotated and typed drafts and related correspondence. Of particular interest is a book draft titled "The Image-Making Workshop: An Introduction to Creative Bookmaking" co-created by Pace and Marcia Solomon Simon (Brown University class of 1961). Original folder titles are written in quotations, all other folder titles processor created. This series is arranged alphabetically by title.
Series 6, TALKS AND LECTURES, 1986 – 2024, includes notes or documentation for talks, lectures, or presentations given by Pace. Original folder titles are written in quotations, all other folder titles processor created. This series is arranged alphabetically by record type and then by title.
Series 7, PRINT MATERIALS, 1961 – 2025, includes artist catalogs and newspapers which Pace helped edit. Of particular interest are an artist book by Pace and
Although Brown University has physical ownership of the collection and the materials contained therein, it does not claim literary rights. Researchers should note that compliance with copyright law is their responsibility. Researchers must determine the owners of the literary rights and obtain any necessary permissions from them.
Rosalind Pace papers, Ms-2026-001, Box [#], Folder [#], Pembroke Center Archives, John Hay Library, Brown University.
This collection is arranged into 7 series.
There are no restrictions on access for analog materials, except that the collection can only be seen by prior appointment. Some materials may be stored off-site and cannot be produced on the same day on which they are requested. Advance notice is required to view born-digital records. Born-digital materials in this collection may not have been reformatted yet. Researchers may request access to copies by contacting the John Hay Library with the collection name, collection number, and a description of the item(s) requested. For preservation reasons, original analog and digital media may not be read or played back in the reading room. Users may visually inspect physical media but may not remove it from its enclosure. Audiovisual digitization requests are processed by an approved third-party vendor. Please note, the transfer time required can be as little as several weeks to as long as several months and there may be financial costs associated with the process. Requests should be directed to hay@brown.edu.
Gift of Rosalind Pace beginning in 2025.
See also: Rosalind Pace: Poiesis, Five Decades of Collage by Provincetown Art Association and Museum (PAAM) https://archive.org/details/paamma-Rosalind_Pace_-_Poiesis_Five_Decades_of_Collage