Hull-born, Manchester-based

Wayne Steven Jackson began making theatre, as co-founder of Escape, in 2004. Since then, he has become a solo artist, lecturer, workshop facilitator, writer, and collaborator. Through performance and writing, he explores autobiographical experiences and the vulnerability of memory to map, challenge, and document social change. His theatrical work exploits and experiments with technology as a second performer to represent voices that are, for a number of reasons, not present. His practice has been supported by hÅb, and previously greenroom (Manchester), through Method Lab and Works Ahead, and Arts Council England.

As Head of Theatre and Performance (TaP) at the Arden School of Theatre, he trains creative performers to make postmodern, innovative, and evocative new work. His 2019 doctoral research explored the performance of memory in connection to placemaking, specifically located in his home city of Hull during its year as City of Culture in 2017, and resulted in the critically acclaimed Now|Then. He is a published academic and has presented his research in theatre, performance, and memory both nationally and internationally including at Theatre and Performance Research Association’s annual conference (TaPRA), Queen’s University Belfast, and NCTE’s Assembly for Research in Birmingham, Alabama.