The Arts Foundation is a registered charity and is governed by a Board of Trustees and managed by a Director and a small team of creatives around the delivery of the Arts Foundation Futures Awards Fellowship Programme.
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Mary Jane Edwards
Director
Mary Jane has a background in social and visual arts and has held senior roles in several public arts institutions in the UK. She is interested in exploring alternative structures for sustaining and connecting artistic practice, civic engagement and knowledge exchange. During her career, Mary Jane has been privileged to commission and produce new artworks with early-career artists and eminent practitioners, such as Larry Achiampong, Marcus Coates, Yunchul Kim, Agnès Varda, Bill Morrison and Steve Reich. She has also collaborated with international partners such as Arts at CERN, CCCB and lieu le unique.
In addition to the arts, Mary Jane has worked in social policy, with a particular focus on youth employment within the creative industries, and social finance for common good. She also established and co-led an environmental art collective, which connects the practices of artists, scientists, and researchers with an emphasis on ecology and environmental sciences.
Outside of her work with the foundation, Mary Jane has an independent creative studio and consultancy focused on art-led social, cultural and environmental development, currently working with Greenpeace UK.
Mary Jane is a Trustee of Wysing Arts Centre, an Honorary Fellow and Advisory Board Member of the University of Liverpool Science and Literature Hub, and a member of The Association of Women in the Arts (AWITA).
