As a multidisciplinary artist and Theatre Maker - music and movement are inseparable. I consider myself a visual storyteller, I use imagery in the music & text I write and create movement from there. In both, my ambition is to make meaningful contemporary performance work that has its own aesthetic. More recently I have been developing a writing practice which is allowing me a new entry point into the making process, to interrogate social norms & culture, expose inequalities and sift for gold. As an artist I don’t fit a traditional mould and I draw on my various disciplines to express myself. I like to work collaboratively and feel I am at my best when I’m sharing and experimenting to thrash out ideas. I like to take reality, acknowledge it, twist it, abstract it and amplify it to make something special and almost always over the top. I’m often inspired by images, sounds, film and music both old and new.

DANCEHALL

DANCEHALL is a new show in collaboration with Sound Designer & Composer Alma Kelliher. A meditation on Dance in Ireland, its death and its resurrection. A spectacle of hearty music and dance through a nuanced contemporary theatre making lens. Expect diamontés, fizzy orange, giddy lights and nostalgia. Supported by the Arts Council of Ireland, K-FEST & Siamsa Tire – The National Folk Theatre of Ireland.

Created in collaboration with cast

Sound Designer & Performer: Alma Kelliher | Dance Artist: Sibéal Davitt | Dance Artist: Carol O’Connor | Voice Over’s by: Eileen O’Connor & Evelyn Kelliher | Sound Engineer: Chris Somers | Production Support: Mikey Griffin | Set Consultation by: Sarah Foley | Set installations created by: Jade O’Connor | Filmed by: Rob Noonan (twisted Vision) | Supported by: The National Folk Theatre of Ireland Siamsa Tire, KFEST Music & Arts Festival, Commissions Award recipient - Arts Council of Ireland.

Ongoing research & Development: It’s a post-dancehall era, a time where the halls we used to dance in are dying. I am interested in exploring dance and music in Ireland. Collecting stories, images and footage has become part of my ongoing research and development of this work. It feels more important than ever to get people back into their bodies and into the halls and I want to create that arena, that atmosphere. Somewhere safe to come together and dance. In this non-traditional theatre work we encourage the audience onto their feet, that behaves as a catalyst to bring them out dancing, we perform on ground level which take the walls away and just lets us be in a space together. I’m interested in putting work on in underutilised spaces such as Basketball halls, community halls, warehouses, schools and broaden the version of traditional dance theatre shows. I am looking for new spaces, places to inhabit. Places to bring to life or to put life back into.Dancing together and maybe even singing together? Connect / reconnect, Decode, shake the rust off and get to the heart of something.

WHITE WASH

If those liquid murmurs got so loud that they bubbled to the surface, could we handle it? ‘White Wash’ examines the inaccuracies of female history, surrenders it, airs it so we can take care of it. Expect stellar performances by carol o connor & ryanlucey and beautiful visuals by Stephen O’Donoghue & Gary Cahillane.

“The basic premise in this world is that our mental cultural template for a POWERFUL PERSON is resolutely male”. Have we allowed ourselves to be white washed? This show is fully loaded with high energy dance, original song, text, sound design and projected visuals shot in the Maherees in Co.Kerry. 

HAUS OF FASH HUN by FemmeBizarre

(FemmeBizarre co-directors: Jade O’Connor & Kate Finegan)

“Haus of Fash Hun is completely and utterly cracked – and in the best way. The duo's exaggerated dramatics left the audience in stitches, and the show's core message about fame, materialism and self-worth leaves some semblance of a moral to the onstage antics”

— The IRISH TIMES

Supported by The Arts Council of Ireland, The Irish Aerial Centre & Solstice Arts Centre.

A recipient of The Romilly Masters Award, IACC Unlocked Award & Nominated for Best production Ensemble at Dublin Fringe 23

Directed & Co-created by: Eoghan Carrick | Assistant Director Aidan Crowe

Cast: Stephen Kerr, Merlin Stone, Jade O’Connor & Kate Finegan

Co-created by: Jade O’Connor & Kate Finegan

Lighting: Suzie Cummins | Costume & Set Sarah Foley

Stage Manager: Aimee Crilly | Production Manager Maisie Lorimer

Producer: Ailsing Ormande

Composition, design & live music: Stephen Kerr & Jenny O’Malley

NAKED LIGHTS by Jeda De Brí

Galway Film Fleadh 2024.

Choreography / Movement Direction by: Jade O’Connor

Emma is stuck in a dead-end job as a night shift attendant at a petrol station. When a masked stranger arrives one night, threatening to burn the place to the ground, Emma is all that stands in his way

SAUCE Directed by Jeda De Bri 

Choreography / Movement Direction by: Jade O’Connor

Supported by the Irish Theatre Institute, Fishamble: The New Play Company, and Dublin Fringe Festival 2019.

Written by Ciara Elizabeth Smyth

Cast: Bláthín Mac Gabhann / Clodagh Mooney Duggan & Camille Lucy Ross

Choreography by Jade O’Connor

“a really funny show that is also very saucy, just not in the way you might expect”

—the Irish Times

CAGED Directed by Jenny Jennings & FemmeBizarre

Dublin Fringe Festival, Irish Aerial Festival & National Tour. Supported by The Arts Council of Ireland & Solstice Arts Centre.

Winner: The Judges Choice award Dublin Fringe 2017

“Caged has a lot of energy and delivers two committed performances from Kate Finnegan and Jade O’Connor”

- The Arts Review

Created & Performed by Jade O’Connor & Kate Finegan

CAGED is an emotional roller coaster through the ages: an unnerving unearthing of the past and a raw discovery of who we are today and yet what we can become. This powerhouse performance gives a visceral insight into what it means to be a woman now.  

MOVEMENT DIRECTOR & CHOREOGRAPHER

LOAH UNVEILED

Directed by Ellius Grace

Written by LOAH

Choreography / Movement Direction by: Jade O’Connor

“The video seems to document a slow, determined odyssey toward freedom and space” 

-THE THIN AIR