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Jennifer Anyan - Biography 

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I am an artist, creative director and fashion studies scholar - labels aren't always helpful, but these terms describe what I do most accurately. My work engages in a critical and playful exploration of the fashioned body using interdisciplinary methods. I draw, collage, photograph and film. I work with voices, I work with garments, mostly on bodies. Projects such as Fashioning the Voice and Embodied Memories have been collaborative and drawn upon the skills and expertise of others to realise an outcome and at the other end of the spectrum other works such as Eroding the Otherness are completed entirely alone, taking an approach that is intimate and deeply personal. Both collaborative and individual forms of practice are integral to what I do. 

I use my practice as a starting point to write about the fashioned body, working within a theoretical framework that considers both the ways that we read and experience styled bodies. Both the journal paper Eroding the Otherness and the research exposition Interrogating the notion of 'frock consciousness' through the practice of dressing and responding to dressed bodies explore approaches to writing that are performative and draw upon auto-ethnographic methodologies. I have been called a ‘punk researcher’ by a peer reviewer, a term that explains well my approach that draws from a range of methods and makes connections. 

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I have a BA (Hons) from Winchester School of Art and MA from Central Saint Martins in Fine Art, and worked commercially as a fashion stylist for a number of well-known brands before moving into a full time academic position in 2007 at Southampton Solent University. During my time at Solent I led the development of 5 BA and 5 MA courses in total, becoming Associate Professor of the Art of Fashion and Head of Postgraduate Provision in 2018. In 2021 I left Solent to work with a range of international HE institutions and develop my art practice. 

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I have given guest lectures and conference papers at Winchester School of Art (University of Southampton), Hong Kong Design Institute (where I was Visiting Fellow in 2012), London College of Contemporary Arts, London College of Fashion, Pearl Academy of Fashion, Delhi & Mumbai,  The ISDI School of Design and Innovation, Mumbai, the India Design Summit, The University of Zurich, The University of Zagreb and China Academy of Arts.

Education 

2006-2008

MA Fine Art - Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts, London, UK

1998-2001

BA (Hons) Fine Art - Winchester School of Art, University of Southampton, UK

Selected Exhibitions 

Solo

2012

Embodied Memories, John Hansard Gallery 

Group

2017

LITERATU STREET Vilnius Academy of Arts, Lithuania

2017

LOST AND FOUND AND LOST AGAIN: National Being Human Festival of the Humanities 

2008

DIY, Nolita's Gallery, London

2007

NORTH & SOUTH, John Hansard Gallery

2005

A CITY OF SHOES, Theatre Royal, Winchester

2004-5

HATS AND GLOVES, City Gallery, Leicester then touring 

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