BIO
Jason Jenn creates site-specific immersive experiences that illuminate, educate, and entertain participants. He is an interdisciplinary multimedia artist and arts administrator.
His works vary in roles as performer, writer, visual artist, director, producer, designer, curator, and filmmaker. He creates for exhibition on stage, on screen, on the page, in galleries, and at site-specific locations.
His work is about making adjustments to obtain balance in an era of extremes. The aim is to engage the mind conceptually and perhaps tickle the heart, often mixing humor with tragedy and beauty with pain.
Works frequently contain sociopolitical and queer empowered themes. There is keen interest in reexamining familiar archetypes and universally appealing topics, infusing them with a fresh, revelatory perspective. Visuals often take on a dream-like quality, evoking fantastical events and suggesting strange narratives, pulling viewers in for an unexpected and inspiring journey.
Under the alias Troubadour Trixter, Jason delivers provocative ideas in the tradition of the Trickster archetype.
POETRY PERFORMANCE
A current and ongoing performance-based project is the creation of dramatic interpretations of queer poetry. These performances become collaborations with the deceased authors, creating greater awareness and appreciation of these underrepresented literature works. The aim is to enhance the literary experience, bringing the words to vivid life on stage and making them more accessible to contemporary audiences.
*In 2011, he presented the poetry of Constantine P. Cavafy to tell the Greek writer’s emotional life story in a full-length production called Cavafy’s Caress.
*In 2012, he inhabited French author and filmmaker Jean Cocteau.
*In 2013, 2014, and 2020 Jason frolicked with the whimsical words of James Broughton in Ecstasy For Everyone! (the title comes from one of the poet’s mottos, “I believe in ecstasy for everyone!”). Jason toured elements of the show at several locations (New York, San Francisco, Palm Springs, Vashon) alongside screenings of the documentary film “Big Joy: The Adventures of James Broughton”.
*For the 30th Anniversary of West Hollywood in 2015, Jason collaborated with dancers and live music to present Paul Monette’s heartbreaking poetry in response to his lover’s death during the height of the AIDS crisis.
*2016 manifested performances for Harold Norse, the respected Beat generation poet and mentor of Charles Bukowski, in Centennial Celebrations sponsored by the SF Beat Museum.
*In 2019, Jason researched and selected love poems from a vast pantheon of LGBTQ poets from history (from Sappho to Mary Oliver, Walt Whitman to James Baldwin) to create LET LOVE FLOURISH during World Pride’s “Love is Love” theme.
MORE ABOUT
Since 2022 he is the Sr. Technical Assistant / Curatorial Assistant for Lancaster’s Museum of Art & History (MOAH) and specifically oversees the MOAH:CEDAR facility, which serves as a community-engagement hub featuring an exhibition space, weekly open mic, live concert series, figure-drawing, and zine-making workshops.
Jason was born and raised in rural Iowa surrounded by farm fields, forests, rivers, and rolling hills – influential to his body of work, which strives to delve deeper into natural and environmental concerns. He received a Bachelor’s Degree from the University of Iowa, double majoring in Film & Media Production and Theatre Arts.
Jenn moved to Los Angeles in 1998 and spent several years working for the art departments of the Hollywood film and television industry. He created his own independent consulting and creative arts company ReEvolutionary Productions, in late 2000. In 2017 he joined forces with another visual artist with a video/media background, Vojislav Radovanović. Together they founded L.A. Art Documents, a media company providing quality video and photographic documentation to document, promote, and curate the contemporary arts community in Los Angeles and Beyond.
Jenn studied and performed for seven years under the guidance of Rachel Rosenthal, Los Angeles Cultural Treasure & Theatre Maverick. He honed his skills and co-created works for five years with the underground performance troupe The Invisible Theater.
From 2012-2021 he produced creative events for the City of West Hollywood’s One City One Pride LGBTQ Arts Festival, including four years as director/producer of the popular Stuart Timmons’ City of West Hollywood LGBTQ History Tour.
From 2012-2016, Jenn co-produced a plethora of crowd-pleasing events and performances at Spirit Studio, a community center and cabaret in Silver Lake. There he produced three one-man shows written by and starring Robert Patrick Playwright (“Kennedy’s Children,” “The Haunted Host”), and weekend festivals such as Gay May Days, Homo-Harvest, and Hay Days LA featuring drag superstar Alaska Thunderfuck. Additionally, Jason was the first Production Manager of gallery and stage productions for the Los Angeles LGBT Center’s Lily Tomlin & Jane Wagner Cultural Arts Department.
From 2014-2019 Jenn worked as the Operations Director for a multimedia video post-production and videowall consultation company called Holonyne Corporation (also known as PennRose Studios & Virtularium Videowall Gallery) – that oversaw the programming of the massive video wall structures at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. From 2019-2021 he was Outreach Specialist for the Torrance Art Museum, curating the exhibition Even Sparkles Have Shadows and receiving commendations from the City of Torrance, County of Los Angeles, and State of California for his work.
He enjoys organic gardening. Bees hold a particular sway on his artistic mythology. He likes wishing everyone “Blissings” with great sincerity and a subtle wink of not taking himself too seriously.
