Irregular Arts was founded by Jenny Wilson in 2013. Alongside leading the company, she has instigated other projects and initiatives, and works freelance as an artist, writer, producer, facilitator and coach. Jenny says:
I want a more desirable world for everyone. I work for change; personally, with other people, and as far as I can reach. I try to imagine, realise, and invite others to work together to shape our world. I do this through:
- Creativity: Creative practice, performance and writing
- Facilitation: Exploring possibilities and actions with individuals and groups
- Activism: Instigating projects and campaigns
- Living: Experimenting within my own life, relationships, and sphere of influence
For anyone trying to “be the change you want to see in the world”, the starting point is imagining it. Then it becomes possible to describe it, share it, and shape possibilities together. With each step we begin to make change real – for our self, for each other, and for the world.
Since 2017 Jenny has been authoring a blog on consensual relationships and ethical non-monogamy at Love, off Script. Identifying as a queer, polyamorous relationship anarchist, she shares her experiences there as a means to raise awareness and grow acceptance of alternative, ethical relationship practices.
In 2018 Jenny instigated the International Day of Consent(30th November), authoring the Consent Manifesto, an invitation to create social change using consent, agency, and choice. The initiative now has its own momentum, gathering support via social media, and in 2021 a new Podcast. The International Day of Consent is now championed annually by a range of organisations using the hashtag #IDoConsent
Emerging from the Covid-19 pandemic, Jenny has been exploring interactive online artistic practices and ways to connect and support interpersonal and social change. In 2022 she re-launched her coaching practice with the Noticings programme. Diagnosed with ADHD in 2021, aged 50, Jenny has developed her practice in ways that are specifically adaptive to the needs of neurodivergent people. She is continuing to develop this work, drawing on her association with Upwording.
Jenny is presently exploring ‘ritual’ as a means to enhance the impact for participants in workshops and facilitated sessions, and she is touring a Consent Ritual Workshop to groups nationally and internationally, online and in person. She is also developing a new character-based performance, ‘Polly Amour’, as a playful challenge to socially accepted norms about romantic relationships.
She is also currently Chair of Happy Valley Pride and in artistic/activist residency with Leeds Beckett University SSSH! Research Group, as well as an occasional co-Producer with Cabaret Heaven, who have run infamous cabaret events in West Yorkshire and beyond since the early 1990s.
