JEN RAE – ABOUT

Dr Jen Rae is a Narrm (Melbourne)-based artist-researcher, facilitator and educator of Canadian Red River Métis-Scottish descent from Treaty 6 Territory. Her 16-year practice-led research expertise is in the discursive field of contemporary environmental art and environmental communication. It is centred around cultural responses to climate change/everything change – specifically the role of artists and creative inquiry.

During her PhD, she worked for the Australian Collaboration synthesising IPCC reports and later the Climate Action Network, further noting the absence of creatives in the fields of climate change communication and advocacy. In 2015, Jen shifted focus to the climate emergency specifically on discourses around food futures [through Fair Share Fare], disaster preparedness and speculative futures predominantly articulated through multi-platform creative projects, research, facilitation and community alliances.

Jen is a core artist of Arts House’s 5-year REFUGE project, whereby artists, emergency service providers and communities work together to rehearse climate related emergencies and explore the impact of creativity in disaster preparedness. Since 2018, Jen has worked co-designing and facilitating Resilience Creative Labs, with Deputy Chief Resilience Officer, Maree Grenfell from The City of Melbourne.

She is also Director of Fair Share Fare and the Co-founder of Fawkner Commons.

 Jen is a board member of the Australian Creative Recovery Network and the International Environmental Communication Association. She has lectured at the post-graduate level in socially-engaged art and performance at the University of Melbourne and Deakin University.