Jennifer Leach

Jennifer Leach
is a ClimateCultures Author

A poet, writer, performer and storyteller whose wild work, forged in the fantastical reaches of deep imagination, brings to life new stories for our strange times.


Jennifer Leach is a poet, writer, performer, storyteller. Her work is wild, forged in the fantastical reaches of deep imagination; she works with myth and archetype -- in an unscholarly, instinctual way -- to bring to life new stories for our strange times.

She is passionate about love and equality, justice and acceptance; she is both an activist and a dreamer. She is Director of Outrider Anthems, the company she established in 2011; it seeks to offer a sanctuary of (challenging) creativity in the inevitable turbulence of climate breakdown. It is a home for all Outriders - those who travel the lonely and perilous path to the boundaries of knowing and experience; the Outriders return with news of distant horizons, to collectively create new anthems for new ways of living.

Each day, Jennifer feels the full honour and magic of being alive, spiritually and creatively charged, in these times of painful change.

Quarantine Connection

Jennifer was one of our members featuring their work as part of the ClimateCultures Quarantine Connection series. We shared her piece, We are Stardust, on Day 31 of the 40-day series to mark the first UK lockdown of the Covid-19 global pandemic.
Creative Conversations 

Jennifer took part in a series of lively and engaging conversations that climate change dramatist Julia Marques recorded with fellow ClimateCultures members. These covered a wide range of topics that inform the work that ClimateCultures celebrates, and Julia introduces them and brings them together in Conversations with Work That Connects. In her video, among many other things, Jennifer shares her environmental passion as a creator of works such as The Festival of the Dark, reconnecting with nature's cycles of life and death, and learning how the process is as important as the product. She shares ideas behind Duende, her new collaborative project with Andrea Carr, and the importance of finding what feeds you rather than what drains you.

Jennifer then took part in a follow-up conversation with Julia and other interviewees. You can find the recordings in Talking to the Crisis, where ClimateCultures editor Mark Goldthorpe reflects on the themes they discussed.
Creative Showcase

Jennifer has contributed a piece to our Creative Showcase portfolio, an evolving collection of new and recent works from our members. Standing Tall, 2022, her photographic and video work witnesses creative community resistance to the corporate felling of 112 trees and the sacrifice of a city’s green lung for more concrete.

Jennifer's ClimateCultures Posts: 

'I wonder what darkness means now?' is an image from Jennifer Leach's book, Dancing in the Dark

Dancing with Darkness

Artist and writer Jennifer Leach recalls the journey from a sharing of darkness at a climate conference for artists and scientists, and the year-long festival she created in its honour, to her new book, Dancing in the Dark. Read More
Jennifer Leach's artwork, The Eyeball

Earth Living — Now, Facing the Storm

Writer and artist Jennifer Leach shared some of her stories at Reading's Earth Living Festival. Here, she discusses these questioning tales for a world's ending -- and the relaunch of her Outrider Anthems enterprise as a sanctuary of Read More
The Gift of the Goddess Tree

The Gift of the Goddess Tree

Artist Jennifer Leach shares another story she performed as part of Festival of the Dark's micro-festival Dazzle. It's a tale of transformation: stretching imagination, shifting vision as key to waking us up. What if the world were other? Read More
What the Bee Sees

What the Bee Sees

Artist Jennifer Leach shares a story about bees, honey, hexagons and robotics. What the Bee Sees is the first of two stories Jennifer performed at the Festival of the Dark's micro-festival Dazzle. What if the world were other? Read More
A Personal History of the Anthropocene – Three Objects #3

A Personal History of the Anthropocene – Three Objects #3

Artist Jennifer Leach selects three objects that evoke a past, present and future Anthropocene, and highlights care and nurture as constants across humanity's ages and communities. Her words move from prose to poetry, suggesting a timeline of hope. Read More
Festival of the dark

Festival of the Dark – Dark February

Artist Jennifer Leach introduces Reading's year-long Festival of the Dark, whose purpose is to gently lead people into the darkness -- a place of stillness, mystery and contemplation, and a locus of the unknowing and the unknown. 790 Read More